It’s long been known that your job can cause all sorts of health and emotional problems, particularly if you are unhappy in your job or work in a hazardous environment, but most people probably wouldn’t think their job could be making them fat! Obesity and overweight in America has been on the rise for years, and researchers are constantly looking for new ways to identify causes and prevent or slow this epidemic.

With more electronics, technology, and machines, some jobs that used to be manual labor are now performed by operators sitting behind a computer screen or machine controls. Where once we had to walk to a co-workers offices to give them a message, now we can just push a button for the intercom or shoot off an email.

When the average person works 7-10 hours per day, and if most of that time is spent in a sedentary job, it’s no wonder it’s hard to find time to keep active along with all the other responsibilities of life.

Let’s look at the reasons your job might be making you fat:

Your job might be making you fat because… You Forget To Eat:

I now this sounds counter-productive and forgetting to eat sounds like it should result in weight loss, but that’s not the case. It’s not unusual for an American worker to wake and skip breakfast in a rush to head to work or get the family off to school or work. Then a deadline or finances or time simply keeps one from eating lunch, or else eats only a small lunch, and then back at the grindstone.

Then what happens? Well, you probably leave work, run errands, pick up kids or groceries or run to pay bills, then make it home and you have homework, housework, personal responsibilities, and the like. Finally, sometime after seven in the evening, you decide to eat a big meal, and then you sit and don’t move until bedtime, where you sleep and don’t move for the next 6-8 hours or so.

With this lifestyle, the only big meal of the day is eaten after all activity that would burn off the calories from that meal have ceased!

Your job might be making you fat because…You Don’t Move Much at Work:

Technology is a wonderful thing, but it’s moved us out of the ‘field’ and into the ‘chair’. Even some manual labor jobs are now performed by machines, where the operator need only sit and push buttons. If your job is mostly sedentary, simple adjustments can make such a surprising difference. For example, isometrics, the practice of tightening or clenching muscles and holding that; stretching the muscles and range of motion exercises can all be performed while sitting in your chair.

It might seem silly at first, but if no one is around, sucking in the stomach and holding it, butt clenches, stretching your legs out in front of you and rotating the foot and bending and flexing at the ankle, arm stretches, and other easy to perform stretches and muscle tightening exercises can all help tone the body, and you don’t even have to stop working to do them!

Also, instead of taking your 15-minute break to walk to the snack machine, consider taking a walk around the building instead. Doing a short, brisk walk in the morning or afternoon or both will not only burn calories, but you’ll find you have more energy (better than a cup of coffee!) Not only will you burn more calories, but you’ll feel better too.

Be sure to stand and stretch at least once per hour while working in a sitting job, and if you have a message for a coworker, consider walking to their office or desk instead of shooting off an email or picking up the phone. Little things do add up and make a difference in weight gain prevention.

Your job might be making you fat because…You Eat Absentmindedly Out Of Boredom.

It’s easy to sit at your desk, working on a spreadsheet, writing, corresponding, calculating, etc, and absentmindedly pop snacks down your throat without even realizing you’re doing it. Keep the snacks out of your office. No candy, no chips, no beef sticks, not even hard candy! Put these snacks in the employee break room, locker, your car, somewhere where you can access them if you want or need a snack (and choose healthy snacks too!), but not in your desk where you can just grab a snack and eat without thinking.

Your job might be making you fat because…You’re Feeling Stressed.

Stress has been proven to hinder weight loss and is believed to aid in weight gain, particularly weight gain around the mid-section. If you are feeling stressed in your job, it’s a good idea to find out what the source of that stress is, eliminate it or reduce it as much as possible. If you can’t eliminate it or reduce it, it just might be time to look for another job. After all, chronic stress is bad for the body, mind and soul. Is your job really worth being miserable over, gaining weight, risking heart problems, or mental and emotional health issues?

Your job might be making you fat because…You Eat Out Everyday for Lunch.

If you’re not one of those who skips lunch and then pigs out at dinnertime right before bed, chances are you fall into the other group of folks who go out for lunch everyday, either fast food, or a large meal at a restaurant with coworkers. With the fast food, chances are you shovel it in faster than you can taste it to get all your errands done on your lunch break and then rush back to the office, not even cognitively acknowledging you’ve eaten! For the restaurant crowd, well, heavy, rich foods eaten at lunch regularly, then going on to eat dinner that evening with no real physical output during the day, and weight is going to slowly creep up on you.

Losing weight or maintaining a healthy weight does not have to be a major upheaval in your life. Little changes in your diet, habits, routine, and paying attention to your own body cues (such as only eating when truly hungry) can make a huge difference if your job is making you fat!