5 ways your job is making you gain extra pounds
According to a study carried out by CareerBuilder, 41% of participants said they had gained weight during their employment. There are a lot of factors that play a significant role in this situation. For instance, your diet, physical activities, the ratio of consuming and burning calories, etc., everything affects your waistline. In today’s competitive world, it’s a task for the working millennials to maintain a healthy work-life balance, which has taken a toll on their health and wellness.
Almost everyone you know will point diet as an integral factor in regards to gaining weight. While that’s true, it doesn’t cover the entire picture.
As much as we scrutinize our diet, we fail to emphasize on our sedentary lifestyle. Here are some explanations why your work life might stack you on the extra pounds:
- Working extra-hours:
It is imperative to manage a proper diet and lifestyle to keep your health and weight in check. However, erratic working hours or working extra hours now and then messes up your daily diet and routine. You also don’t get enough time to sleep and exercise. All these factors disrupt your hormones and disturb your regular life cycle. Your appetite increases, and you end up eating anything and everything you find around.
2) Stress Inducing Environment:
You are always stressed at your job and are under pressure to meet deadlines. Unknowingly, with all that stress, you end up increasing your hormones named Cortisol that triggers cravings. These hormones trigger hunger at untimely hours, and as a response to it, you end up hogging on the food you shouldn’t. Proper sleep and exercise help you release stress and in turn, enables you to maintain a healthy eating habit.
3) Multi-Tasking at work:
Studies have discovered that even though the human body can manage multi-tasking, but a body under exhaustion can ultimately lead to stress and hunger. At work, you are so involved with your tasks and activities that at the end of the day, you are completely exhausted, and you consume whatever is within your reach. To avoid this, you should always keep healthy snacks like peanuts with you all the time. They will keep your stomach full and keep you away from all the junk food before dinner.
4) Dehydration at work:
You often forget to hydrate yourself when you are at work. Less consumption of water in a day affect your weight, health, and energy levels. You must be wondering how water can affect your weight. Well, when you deprive your body of water, the fat deposition in your body increases, and that leads to an unhealthy weight gain. Drink 8 glasses of water every day and fuel up your kidney and liver to help them function properly and metabolize your fat.
5) Eating habits of your coworkers:
According to a study, we are naturally inclined towards conforming to eating norms at social settings. If you go to lunch with your co-workers quite often, chances are their unhealthy eating habits may rub off on you as well. In simple words, if your colleagues are ordering high-carb, high-fat foods for their lunch, you are likely to do the same. As a result, you end up gaining a few pounds in the process of fitting in with the crowd.
It’s a rat race and, everyone is working hard to achieve their goals, but it doesn’t have to be at the cost of your health. You should always plan a timeout for your well being and detox your body of the weekly stress and junk. Get proper sleep and indulge yourself in physical activity, which might help you with your extra pounds. And always remember water is your holy grail! Keep yourself hydrated. Food is not a solution to your stress, but calming exercises like breathing and walking are.
Stay healthy and achieve your goals!