Trying to maintain healthy habits can be tough as an adult for a myriad of reasons. But it may be more difficult to hear when a habit you thought was healthy is actually impacting your life in a negative way.
So when Reddit user u/FartyMcShart asked: “What is something super detrimental to your health that most people don’t realize?” over 11 thousand people provided their thoughts. Here’s what they had to say below:
This article is not to replace seeing medical professionals. Health issues are specific to each individual person.
But while none of the below individuals are medical professionals, we provided expert-backed links to provide more context to all of these claims. It’s important to consult with a doctor for personalized medical care.Â
1.“Shift work. Nights, followed by lates, followed by earlies. Physiologically so destructive. I work for the emergency services, so it’s essentially 24/7. The management is pretty good but we’ve been shafted on pay at a national level. It’s still attritional on the body.”
—u/Atiankup
“There are TikTok’s out there of nurses giving tips for how they stay awake after night shifts. Stuff like sticking their hair out the window and closing it on the window so if they start to drift off their head will be yanked back.
A few comments were scolding them and saying that if they’re that tired they just shouldn’t be driving but if that was the case, nurses would either have to live at the hospital or not work at all because there sure aren’t going to be enough nurses to ensure something like this doesn’t happen in the first place.”
View the expert-backed article here and this 2022 research review.
Maskot / Getty Images/Maskot
2.“Gatorade [and sports drinks] are really bad for your teeth.”
“My dad was a machinist for 50 years. One company he was at had contracts to make bottle fillers for Coke and Pepsi. The filler they had to replace the most was for Gatorade as it would rapidly corrode even the most stainless steels they worked with.”
View this 2009 research manuscript and this 2016 researched study.
3.“Not doing things that you loved as a kid before you were concerned with adult responsibilities. Stress is bad for your brain and a lot of people don’t have healthy ways to relieve it.”
4.“Not keeping on top of dental hygiene. Not only does it affect your teeth and gums, gingivitis can affect your joints and cause pain. Plus, bacteria in your mouth can go into your bloodstream and affect your heart. There was a period of time where I didn’t go to the dentist for three years (moved to a new state for college, was extremely busy with schoolwork, and never had a chance to find a new place), flossed maybe a few times here and there, wasn’t always brushing twice a day, and I was right on the cusp of having periodontal disease with irreversible consequences. At that time, I also had increasing joint pain in my hands, wrists, knees, and hips. Don’t skip the dentist.
—u/penndelnj
View the 2020 researched study here.
5.“Missing sleep.”
“It’s very detrimental to your health chronically, involving many organ systems. It increases your sympathetic tone and therefore blood pressure, increases food and sugar cravings while affecting metabolism, puts you at risk for neurodegenerative dementias as you age, impairs your immune system, puts you at risk for cancer, and accelerates atherosclerosis development to name a few. Some of those things are related.”
View a 2018 study here (but more long-term studies need to be conducted for a better conclusion), a 2021 study here, and a 2014 study here.
Boy_anupong / Getty Images
6.“For the love of God, drink some plain water and eat some vegetables — signed your x-ray tech and physicians. Lol.”
“I take constipation or chronic constipation x-rays multiple times a day — abdominal pain, gas bloating? 90% of the time, you just need to poop! I could retire a rich lady if I could charge per exam. Lol.”
View a 2021 study here (However, there is still a shortage of high-quality studies available) and a 2003 study here.
7.“If you do a lot of sitting (like a desk job or a lot of commuting or trucking) and keep your wallet in your back pocket, you’re going to fuck up your spine.”
“This messed up my husband’s leg. He noticed his leg would be asleep at the end of his shift (forklift operator), and I remembered something about wallets in back pockets pressing on your sciatic nerve.”
View a 2018 study here.
Lakshmiprasad S / Getty Images/iStockphoto
8.“Constant stimulus from our phones. It makes us bored easily and increases feelings of loneliness. It makes doing things without watching anything on our phones or being with someone a lot more mentally taxing.”
View a 2023 study here and a 2022 study here.
9.“Not stretching your body every day — hell at least a few times a week.”
10.“Comparing yourself to people. It’s terrible for your mental health.”
—u/Dances28
“This is part of why social media is so damaging, especially to kids. We all have a phase in our childhood where it seems like our life sucks and something is wrong with us. But now with social media, you’re surrounded by people trying to portray their lives in the best possible way — it amplifies the effect of this phase by making kids think everyone else’s life is so fun and glamorous and theirs must be really terrible because it’s nothing like what people are showing on social media. It has a real, significant effect on their perception of what’s normal and the quality of their own lives.”
View an expert-backed article here and a 2022 study here.
11.“Shitty people, especially if they are family.”
“This is so true, and for those who are in the ‘just love your family, no matter what they do’ crowd, they certainly have no idea what it is like having a toxic family, constantly putting you down or causing constant drama. They just cannot relate in the slightest amount to what the toxicity is like, along with the pain of knowing that those people who are supposed to help you out the most (family), are actually the people who are first to put you down and stab you in the back.”
View an expert-backed article here.
12.“Losing a pet, 100%. It’s definitely not taken as seriously as other familial losses, and it should be. It can take a serious toll on your mental health AND physical health.”
“Agreed. When my sweet baby girl died, it didn’t just hurt, but I had to pretend like it didn’t hurt as bad because she was ‘just a pet.’ I’ve lost a parent, grandparents, family, friends, etc. but there are certain ‘pets’ that hurt just the same, if not more.”
View a 2022 study here.
Amber Aiken Photography / Getty Images
13.“Poverty. Now, of course, we all know poverty isn’t good for anyone but even now, I don’t think we as a society realize just how bad it is. It backs you into so many corners concerning your health: Worse food, less time for exercise, more stress in life, less money to address physical issues, and it keeps you stuck in toxic environments (both mentally and physically). It’s just a lot of negative compounding interest.”
—u/tsh87
“Oh man, I was just talking to my good pal about this. We both suffer from bad mental and physical health, and we just cannot improve because poverty is destroying all our resilience. With money, I would still never be healthy, but I could eat better, turn the heating on, and not have such chronic stress.”
—u/FoxNo5724
View a 2006 expert-backed review here.
14.“Negativity.”
“It’s so easy to get addicted to the dopamine that anger and negativity bring. I wish it was talked about more. It took years to unlearn the habit of being cruel to others because it was ‘funny.’ Hate is addictive, and it’s only a downward spiral when you need more and more negativity in your day because it feels good in the short term.”
—u/Mirikitani
View a 2010 study here.
Sutthichai Supapornpasupad / Getty Images
Do you believe there is something super detrimental to your health that most people don’t realize is happening? Let us know what it is and why in the comments below.
The National Alliance on Mental Illness helpline is 1-888-950-6264 (NAMI) and provides information and referral services; GoodTherapy.org is an association of mental health professionals from more than 25 countries who support efforts to reduce harm in therapy.
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