When I was working retail, MBT-brand shoes were a lifesaver for me. They have rounded bottoms that keep you from standing completely still. I thought they went bankrupt, but I see footwear, etc selling them. They are also quite expensive, but Skechers makes a similar product (can’t vouch for these personally)
Rob, I’m sorry to hear about your problem, but thank you for posting it. I use standing desks at both home and office and I know I should go and walk around regularly but when I’m home I often don’t, this will be a good prompt to do so more often. Thanks everyone for the interesting Hardware ideas now I know what I want for the holidays :-)
That is indeed troubling, but give your body a chance to fix this first. The human body is more resilient than even doctors often give it credit for.
I remember my job during college at Safeway, standing as a cashier for hours and hours. Even on a little padded floor thing, it sucked, so I was always highly skeptical of all these standing desk aficionados.
Mixing it up, I can see, but standing all the time is not good.
When I was young and skinny, standing for a double shift was no big deal WRT leg pain. That was a long time ago however.
Sort of funny (but not for you), I read a lot earlier this year about how sitting was all bad for you and that you should stand while working. Then a few months after that, I read more articles that said, yeah, sitting all day is bad, but standing all day is bad in other ways. Like in most things in life, balance seems to be best.
Thanks again for people who have had suggestions and words of encouragement.
I’m hoping @wumpus is right and that maybe it hasn’t been going on long enough to get to the point where I’ll always have trouble. The thing is, I have never had any pain associated with this at all. I didn’t and don’t feel any discomfort, although the skin did get itchy several times. Turns out it is another symptom, but for me it is just sporadic.
I’ll keep my finger’s crossed that maybe this condition is in its early days and I’ll get lucky and my circulation will bounce back.
This, and like @DaveLong says - moderation. I tend to be an ‘all in’ type of person. Turns out there are lots of things ‘all in’ isn’t that great.
Thank you @robc04 for sharing. I know it’s not always easy to share personal details like this, but I really just set-up my sitting and standing functions, and it never occurred to me that standing more would require more consideration than just not sitting all the time. Between work and my computer hobbies, 12-14 hours a day on my ass, I do get up and move, easy. It can’t be good on me.
No problem Nesrie. Alternating between sitting and standing with moving around in between is probably the best we can do, so it sounds like you’re on the right track.
@robc04 thanks for sharing. I googled a bit and found some info on Venous insufficiency from U.S. National Library of Medicine : https://medlineplus.gov/ency/article/000203.htm
Risk factors:
Age
Family history of this condition
Female gender (related to levels of the hormone progesterone)
History of deep vein thrombosis in the legs
Obesity
Pregnancy
Sitting or standing for long periods (DING DING DING)
Tall height
Yeah I was thinking about having a standing desk because of health benefit, but now I may have to settle with more exercise. I guess sometimes there really is no shortcut to good health
You can pay for the desk that raises and lowers. You could use a timer to alternate between sitting and standing.
If you can get a desk that raises and lowers (I like the Jarvis one I have), and can be good about alternating - that is probably the best.
I’m tall, but not super tall at 6’1’’ - but maybe that also contributed. I’m also getting close to 50 years old.
I just have a treadmill desk next to my normal desk. At my normal desk I have 3x1200p with a normal keyboard and mouse and on my treadmill desk I have a 55" 4k TV + trackball. I use Ultramon to switch between the two instantly but I can also have it all up and working at once. Doesn’t take more time than physically moving 4 feet over so it’s about as flexible and fast as you can get.
Your doctor probably already suggested it, but if the underlying cause is veinous, you should use compression socks. You will notice in moments if they do help (basically it will feel like taking huge weights our of your legs). They help also tremendously for muscle aches after walking or standing. They may also slow down the propagation of the condition.
Just be sure to take proper measures (I get measured every year, to get socks that are the proper size), to not wear them when lying down, and to give them proper care, or they will turn into torture devices.
They are used by lots and lots of clerks who have to stay standing in their stores for hours, here, with great effects.
I started using them when I was 35 because of veinous insufficiency (although I don’t check a single slot on that list @Soma posted), and have been wearing them daily. I will never go out not wearing them, they make that much of a difference in my case.
It’s because they make you look sexy, isn’t it. Isn’t it.
Frankly, they look nothing like the thing I remember people were joking about when I was a kid. You’d be… hard-pressed, to tell the difference with common socks.
They are just risk factors, not a prognosis. These things just happen in all sorts of situations.
How old are you? It could be a lot worse than venous insufficiency. It’s futile to look for a cause of it. Any time you spend on that is time wasted.
I would try and exercise as much as you can, and forget about all this ridiculous rubbish of standing vs sitting etc. It’s nonsense.
Any exercise, it doesn’t matter. Blood pumps everywhere.
Truth is its nothing, really, in the grander scheme of health. Maybe you don’t want to hear that, but it’s the only thing that will stop you being afraid and concentrate on exploiting your potential.
I admit, I needed…
…the ellipsis to cue me in on that.
I woudln’t be surprised if being upright instead of sitting down made little difference. The key to beating this thing seems to be just to keep moving.
A few years ago I read an article about the dangers of sitting for long stretches of time. The article cited a study where people wearing special underwear/harnesses riddled with sensors tracking several metabolic parameters during a period of time at the workplace. One of the goals was to find out why some people’s bodies reacted much worse (i.e., gained much more weight) than others in the context of a sedentary lifestyle.
I remember being shocked by the results-- it turns out that when you’re sitting your metabolism drops to near zero. The simple act of bending over to tie their shoes produced a noticeable spike in the subjects’ graphs at the end of the day. With prolonged inactivity, many processes related to typical health indicators in your body (insuline, cholesterol, lipids) go haywire or simply reduce their effectiveness drastically.
The secret behind the people who fared quite better despite being subjected to the same working conditions? They were unconsciously moving all the time. Fidgeters. They would make a little run to the water cooler, tap their feet to music, generally standing up for different reasons much frequently than those who did worse.
Discouragingly, one of the other findings was that the harmful effects of sedentarism are not easily reverted, not even by hitting the gym 3 times a week. My takeaway was that you need to get the juices flowing during the day-- by any means. Any step you take in this direction (literally) helps.
In the past I have heard several news stories about standing vs sitting at work. The basic gist of it is this:
Sitting all day is bad.
Standing all day is much worse than sitting all day.
The ideal solution would involve you sitting, but getting up and walking around a bit every 30 minutes to an hour.
For me, I just drink a lot of water, and my bladder makes sure I get up often enough.