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6 regular habits that are bad for you

There are common habits you indulge in that could be jeopardizing your good health.

Despite your best efforts, you might still be putting your personal health at risk with some very common habits

You have regular checkups, you exercise, you sleep for the right amount of hours, drink the right amount of water; all of these in a bid to stay as healthy as possible, because these are all important to keep a healthy lifestyle.

However, there are still a few minor things that you could be doing wrong that are having adverse effects on your general well-being and just generally mess you up down the road.

Despite your best efforts, these common habits could be jeopardizing your good health:

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1. Sitting for too long

As mundane as sitting is, it could be very bad for you, depending on how long and how frequently you do it.

Excessive sitting can be as serious as causing a heart disease or decreased mental health. Research indicates that sitting for too long for long stretches of time negatively affects sugar and fat metabolism in the body, and can increase a person's risk of diabetes and heart disease.

Even if you're a person that exercises regularly, excessive sitting can undo all of the good that does you, which is why it's beneficial for you to move around frequently for as much as it is possible and cut down on the number of hours you stay rooted to one spot.

2. Overexposure to electronic screens

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This is probably a very well known fact, but it hasn't really dissuaded anyone from carelessly exposing themselves to bright electronic screens, from computers, to phones, to television sets.

More than four hours of exposure to electronic screens can, depending on the rewiring it does on your body system, affect the effectiveness of insulin and raise the risk of type 2 diabetes.

Just like sitting, it is wise to get breaks between stretches of time when you have to use electronic screens, most especially computers and phones, because you have to be closer to them than with televisions.

Also, turn down the brightness for as bearably as you can.

3. Using contact lenses for too long

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So this is not a habit you're expected to develop if you don't naturally have an eye defect but it is a corrective measure that you should apply more carefully, and probably less frequently.

Contact lenses are directly applied to the eyes, thereby, blocking the important tissues from getting the right amount of oxygen that's needed.

Used indiscriminately over a stretch of time, the corneas might suffer from the lack of adequate oxygen, and you could end up with a lot more problems.

It's important to wisely apply breaks in-between usage of contact lenses.

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4. Biting your fingernails

The human hand touches a lot of different things, clean and, more usually, dangerously unclean.

This is why the fingertips can be harbouring bacteria, as dangerous as salmonella or e. coli, at any point in time.

While biting the fingernails may not be as regular a habit for some as it is for others, it is quite easy, and very possible, to bite your nails from time to time for whatever reason.

When you do this, you're mixing the bacteria directly with the mouth and turning it into a breeding ground for them, declaring a gastrointestinal war on your own system.

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It's just best to keep your fingers/fingernails out of your mouth, for whatever reason.

5. Holding in your farts/sneezes

So you are a responsible social animal that recognizes social manners and thoroughly respects them.

But you're also a regular human being who gets the occasional wink from nature down in your nether regions.

If you're in the middle of company when nature dials you up, the most polite thing to do is excuse yourself and find the unfortunate space that'll harbour the results.

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However, if you can't excuse yourself, the polite option would be to hold on to the abomination for as long as possible before you get your chance to smuggle it out.

This is one of the rare times when being polite might be inconvenient for your health.

This is because holding in your fart is an unhealthy habit that could unfortunately burden you with stomach cramps and pain. It might not sound like a dire consequence, because it's not, but you could do without the unnecessary pain.

So, yes, you could be the butt of all jokes among your friends or coworkers for the next couple of months, but you'd be saving yourself some physical pain.

This is also applicable to holding in your embarrassing sneeze, as you could end up with a more upsetting nose bleed, or nasal cartilage fracture.

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6. Waking up to alarms

So it's quite common to be a lousy sleeper who finds it hard to crawl out of bed without the constant droning of an alarm to be the bad guy.

According to Research by the National Institute of Industrial Health in Japan, waking up to the nuisance of an alarm could be a dangerous routine for your heart, as it can rush your adrenaline, causing higher blood pressure and heart rate.

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