Don’t blame it all on the chips and cookies. Your day-to-day habits—ones you don’t even think twice about—might be packing on the pounds.
Sneaky waist-wideners hide out in habits so ingrained in our day-to-day lives that we don’t even challenge them. The good news is that once you realize how these automatic actions affect your weight, you can stop, think and change your behavior.
Watch out for these 9 fattening habits, and you might just drop a few pounds without really trying:
Browsing Every Grocery Aisle
Think of how your favorite supermarket is laid out. Fruits and veggies are on one end, meats on another, dairy another. And the middle aisles? Canned, boxed, packaged and processed foods full of fats, sugar, additives and preservatives. Do your body (and wallet) a favor by shopping from the store’s perimeters. If you must shop from those center aisles, read nutrition labels, paying attention to fat grams, sugar content, calorie count and serving size.
Avoid products with a long ingredient list, says registered dietitian Gaye Lynn Hicks with The Methodist Weight Management Center in Houston. “The top five ingredients listed make up the food; the rest are preservatives and additives.”
Not Sleeping Enough
Have you been ignoring your own bedtime? Not logging enough shut-eye may be sabotaging your waistline. One study found that well-rested folks lost more than twice as much fat than the sleep deprived, though overall weight loss remained the same for both.
Lack of sleep might also make you more likely to reach for a snack. Stanford University researchers discovered that people who slept less than 8 hours a night had increased BMIs (body mass index) that went hand-in-hand with decreased sleep levels. Why? When you don’t sleep enough, the levels of two appetite-regulating hormones—leptin and ghrelin— change and likely make you hungrier.
Sitting Near the Buffet and Digging Right In
Beware of buffets. Brian Wansink, author of Mindless Eating: Why We Eat More Than We Think, observed more than 200 diners at all-you-can-eat Chinese restaurant buffets. He found that obese diners tended to face the buffet table, sit closer to it, and dig right in; while thinner people were more likely to sit farther away and browse the buffet before grabbing a plate. Pick your table wisely.
Avoiding Public Transportation
Even if you live in an urban area, it’s all too easy to hop in your car instead of onto the local bus or rail system. But can embracing public transportation help keep you slim? Your odds are good. In a study published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine, researchers found that residents in Charlotte, North Carolina, reduced their risk of becoming obese 81 percent by taking advantage of a new light rail system. So maybe it’s time to reconsider the bus stop and the extra steps you’ll build into your day on your way there.