"Sitting is the new cancer"

Or so opined Tim Cook, Apple CEO, when espousing the virtues of the smart watch at a

pre-launch corporate event. What he meant to say was 'sitting is the new smoking'.

On a bitterly cold day as I strode past the my oak at record breaking pace in a vain attempt to stay warm I thought back to 3 Octobers ago - the morning I woke with searing pain in virtually every part of my body, fell out of bed to the floor 2 feet below tears in my eyes, unsure what the problem was. The latest Ebola crisis had just begun in West Africa and I was convinced I had somehow managed to contract it on a recent flight back from Seoul!

It turned out to be sciatica-like, possibly sacroiliac joint dysfunction, whatever it was, it was fekkin' painful and rendered me not much better than useless from October until the following March.

I had been leading a very sedentary life, ensconced before my computer for up to 12 hours a day for almost 15 years and it finally got the better of me. It was my wake up call.

Experts are now describing sitting as ‘the new smoking’, a ticking time bomb of ill health just waiting to explode. The World Health Organisation has already identified physical inactivity as the fourth biggest killer on the planet, ahead of obesity. It now costs the UK economy more than £1billion every year in sick days due to back, neck and muscle problems and that figure is still rising.

The moment I could stand upright and felt less like a quadruped than a human being, I vowed that I would never again put myself at risk of suffering that pain, and the uncertainty of when the pain would end, again.

I have been walking at least an hour a day since and have probably missed 12-15 days over the past 35 months.

I feel so much the better for it and as a bonus have lost those extra pounds middle age had deemed were my reward for having fed and watered myself so well.

So get up out of your chair as often as you can, question whether you could walk it rather than drive it, take the stairs rather than the escalator - just keep moving whenever you ca.

As Martin Luther King Jr. said 'The time is always right to do what is right.'

#sittingisthenewcancer #TimCook #Apple #sciatica #MartinLutherKingJr