如果你在床上工作一年会发生什么？

By Bryan Lufkin

作者：布莱恩.勒夫金

The allure of working from bed is strong – but turning your mattress into your office can trigger a slew of health problems, both psychological and physical.

在床上工作的诱惑力固然很大，但是把床垫变成办公室会引发包括心理和生理上的一系列的健康问题。

For many people, working from home, or ‘WFH’, has also come to mean ‘WFB’ – working from bed. Getting dressed and commuting to an office has been replaced by splashing water on your face and cracking open a computer as you settle back under your blanket.

对很多人来说，在家工作也就等于在床上工作。过去常规的穿好衣服去上班，现在已经被随意洗洗脸然后躺在毯子里打开电脑开始工作所取代。
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A staggering number of people are setting up shop on their mattresses; according to a November 2020 study, 72% of 1,000 Americans surveyed said they had worked remotely from their bed during the pandemic – a 50% increase since the start of the crisis. One in 10 reported they spent “most or all of their workweek” – 24-to-40 hours or more – in bed. This is especially true of young workers; in the UK, workers aged 18 to 34 are the least likely to have a proper desk and chair, and are twice as likely to work from bed than older workers.

大量的人群正在他们的床垫上工作; 根据2020年11月的一项研究，在1000名接受调查的美国人中，72%的人表示，他们在疫情期间曾在床上远程工作，这一数据比病毒危机开始时增加了50%。十分之一的人的报告显示，他们“一周的大部分或全部工作时间”，即24到40个小时甚至更多时间，都是在床上度过的。这对年轻工作者来说尤其普遍; 在英国，18岁至34岁的员工在家很大可能是没有适合办公的桌椅的，所以他们在床上工作的可能性是年龄较大员工的两倍。

But WFB isn’t just for lack of a proper chair – many simply love the cosiness and ease of the set-up. On Instagram, the #WorkFromBed hashtag pulls up thousands of photos, many of them featuring smiling people snuggled up in their pyjamas with cups of coffee, maybe even breakfast on a tray.

但在床上办公的原因并不仅仅是因为缺少合适办公的椅子，许多人只是喜欢床上舒适和轻松的设置。在Ins上，#床上办公#的话题标签下人们展示了成千上万张照片，其中很多人的状态都是身着睡衣，面带微笑地依偎在床上，他们手端着咖啡，有些甚至是手拿装着早餐的托盘。
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But the reality is that turning your bed into your office can trigger a slew of health problems, both psychological and physical. And even if you don’t notice them now, adverse effects – possibly permanent – could emerge later on in life.

但事实上，把床变成办公地点会引发一系列心理和生理上的健康问题。即使你现在还没有注意到，但是这些可能持久影响一辈子的负面效果可能会在以后的生活中出现。

Studying and doing homework from bed is bad, too, and working on a bed while lying on your stomach can be especially bad for your body

在床上学习和做作业也很不好，趴着工作对你的身体尤其不好。
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Ergonomic nightmare

人体工程的噩梦

It’s important to acknowledge that working from home is a privilege that isn’t afforded to hundreds of millions of people. Plus, for some remote workers, space for a full workstation just isn’t available, meaning working from bed may be their only choice.

要承认的很重要的一点是，在家工作是一种特权，但并不是数亿人都可以负担得起的特权。此外，对于一些远程工作的人来说，在家设置整张工作台的空间是不够的，这意味着在床上工作可能是他们唯一的选择。

Still, for others, it’s the easiest option and the path of least resistance. (Motivation is an all-time low during the pandemic, after all.) People may have a desk or a kitchen table to place their computer on – they just choose not to.

不过，对另一些人来说，在床上办公是最简单的选择，也是阻力最小的途径。(毕竟，在大流行期间，人们的工作积极性是有史以来最低的。)人们可能有一张桌子或餐桌来放置电脑，只是他们选择不这样做。

Young people are particularly likely to fall victim to these bad habits, because they may not feel the strain of them right away

年轻人尤其容易成为这些坏习惯的受害者，因为他们可能不会马上感受到这些坏习惯带来的压力。

But experts say that regardless of whether working from bed is avoidable or not, the ergonomic advice is the same: it’s not good for your body, so it’s very important to vary your posture and support different parts of your body wherever possible.

但专家们表示，不管在床上工作是否可以避免，人体工程学的建议都是一样的:床上办公对你的身体不好，所以重要的是要频繁调整你的姿势，尽可能让身体的不同部位支撑。

Your neck, back, hips and more are all strained when you’re on a soft surface that encourages you to slump or sprawl. “None of it is optimal,” says Susan Hallbeck, director of health-care-system engineering at the Mayo Clinic, one of the largest medical research institutions in the US. “You’re really not supported in a way that’s conducive to work.”

当你身体处在柔软的环境时，你的脖子、背部、臀部和更多部位都会绷紧，这会使你不由地下沉或伸展。梅奥诊所是美国最大的医学研究机构之一，其医疗保健系统工程主管苏珊·哈尔贝克表示:“没有一种方法是最佳的。你真的没有得到有利于工作的身体支持。”

Young people, she points out, are particularly likely to fall victim to these bad habits, because they may not feel the strain of them right away. But the pain will flare up down the road. And depending on how bad your habits have been over this last year, the damage may already be done. It depends on the person, but it may be too late to undo the ergonomic problems you’ll face when you get older.

她指出，年轻人尤其容易成为这些坏习惯的受害者，因为他们可能不会马上感受到这些坏习惯带来的压力。但随着坏习惯的积累，疼痛总有一天会突然爆发。你过去一年的坏习惯，可能已经造成了伤害。这取决于个人，但当你变老了，那时想要解决人体工程学问题可能就为时已晚了。
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These ailments could include simple headaches, and could also extend to permanent stiffness in your back, arthritis and what’s known as cervical pain – that’s pain in the bones, ligaments and muscles in your neck that allow motion. “Anything is better than continuing the bad habit. Whenever you can stop, stop,” says Hallbeck.

这些疾病可能包括简单的头痛，也可能延伸到你的背部的永久性僵硬，关节炎和所谓的颈椎疼痛——颈椎疼痛是指颈部的骨头、韧带和控制运动的颈部肌肉的疼痛。“任何事情都比继续坏习惯好。只要你能阻止坏习惯就及时阻止吧。” 哈尔贝克说。

If you must continue working from bed (“there are grades of bad,” says Hallbeck), try recreating the experience of sitting in an upright chair as much as you can, and aim for “neutral posture” – that is, avoid putting strain on any one part of your body.

如果你必须继续在床上工作的话(哈尔贝克说:“其实在床上工作有不同等级的坏处”)，试着尽可能多地重现坐在笔直的椅子上的感觉，并以“中性姿势”为目标，也就是说，不要让你身体的任何一个部位承受压力。

Roll up a pillow and stick it under your lower back for lumbar support, put pillows under your knees, try to separate the display from your keyboard (if you’re able) and put the display at eye level or higher. Whatever you do, avoid lying on your stomach to type; it really strains your neck and elbows.

你可以卷起一个枕头，放在你的下背部以支撑腰部，也可以把枕头放在膝盖下，试着把显示器和键盘分开(如果你可以的话)，把显示器放在与眼睛平齐或更高的位置。无论你做什么，都不要俯卧打字;它真的会扭伤你的脖子和肘部。

When in doubt, get creative, like using an ironing board as a makeshift standing desk. But if you possibly can, it’s worth splashing out on some comfort. “If you’re going to be working from home for a long time” – and most experts predict that we will – “it really does pay to invest in a good workstation, even if it’s a very small workstation,” adds Hallbeck.

如果有疑问的话，也可以发挥创意，比如用烫衣板当临时站立式办公桌。但如果可能的话，花点钱买些舒适的东西也是值得的。哈尔贝克补充道:“如果你要长时间在家工作的话（大多数专家预测我们需要这么做），投资一个好的工作台确实值得，即使是一个非常小的工作台也好。”

Breaking your brain

损坏你的大脑

When you work from bed for a year, it doesn’t just potentially wreck your body. It’s possibly bad for your productivity and sleep habits, too.

如果你在床上工作一年，这不仅有可能破坏你的身体，也可能对你的工作效率和睡眠习惯有害。

“As sleep specialists, we tend to recommend that the bed should be for the three Ss: sleeping, for sex or for when you’re sick. That’s it,” says Rachel Salas, associate professor of neurology and sleep expert at Johns Hopkins University in Maryland.

“作为睡眠专家，我们倾向于建议床应该只为三个S服务: 睡觉（sleep），做爱（sex）或病痛(sick)，就是这样的。” 马里兰州约翰霍普金斯大学的神经学副教授和睡眠专家雷切尔·萨拉斯这样说。

“The more you watch TV in bed, play video games in bed and not sleep in bed, your brain starts learning, ‘oh, OK, we can do any one of these activities in bed’. It starts building these associations, which eventually evolve into conditioned behaviours.”

“你在床上看电视、玩电子游戏越多，或者长期不在床上睡觉，你的大脑就会开始学习这种模式，‘哦，好吧，这些活动我们都可以在床上做’。大脑会开始建立这些联系，最终将其演变成习惯行为。”
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Not only does working from your bed spell potential ergonomic disaster, but it can rewire your brain to disassociate your bed with sleep

在床上工作不仅会导致潜在的人体工程学灾难，还会重新连接你的大脑，使你的床与睡眠分离。

This is what experts call ‘sleep hygiene’ – essentially, best practice as it relates to being in bed. Putting on your pyjamas at night is good sleep hygiene because it tells your body it’s time to start shutting down. Doomscrolling or sending emails in bed is bad sleep hygiene.

这就是专家所说的“睡眠卫生”。睡眠卫生从本质上说，就是在床上的最佳实践。晚上穿上睡衣是很好的睡眠卫生，因为它告诉你的身体是时候开始休息了。而在床上滚动或发送电子邮件是不健康的睡眠卫生。

So, when you set up shop in bed with your laptop, phone, Slack and all the glowing screens your job requires every day, your brain and body eventually stop associating bed with rest. That’s a big reason why the pandemic has led to ‘coronasomnia’, says Salas, referring to the global spike in insomnia and sleep disorders that has accompanied Covid-19.

所以，当你躺在床上办公时，你的笔记本电脑、手机、Slack软件和所有工作需要的发光屏幕会让你的大脑和身体最终不再把床和休息联系在一起。萨拉斯说，这是大流行导致“冠状动脉失眠症”的一个重要原因（新冠病毒导致全球失眠和睡眠障碍激增）。

“You’re really training your brain to be alx, and [telling it] this is where your ideas come and this is where it’s full work mode” when you WFB, adds Salas. “When you’re trying to wind down and go to sleep, your brain is like – ‘wait a minute, what are we doing? This is work time’.”

萨拉斯补充道:“（在床上办公时）你实际上是在训练你的大脑对床保持警觉，(告诉它)这里是你灵感的来源，这里是你的完整工作模式。而当你试图放松下来睡觉时，你的大脑会说，‘等一下，我们在干什么?现在是工作时间’。”

Doing this for a year, or any extended period of time, could lead to insomnia, or to something called circadian rhythm disorder. That’s when our bodies’ natural clocks, that tell us when it’s time to sleep, get thrown out of whack in the long term. Salas says it can also aggravate non-sleep-related issues you may have, like restless leg syndrome, in which case the affected body parts need rest to avoid the symptoms associated with the condition.

持续这样做一年，或一段时间，都可能导致失眠，或造成一种被称为昼夜节律紊乱的疾病。我们身体的自然时钟往往会告诉我们什么时候该睡觉了，但长此以往，这种自然时钟会被打坏。萨拉斯说，在床上办公还会加重你可能有的非睡眠相关问题，比如不宁腿综合征，在这种情况下，受影响的身体部位需要足够的休息才能避免与睡眠相关的症状。
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And disturbed nights, body pain or both mean that work-wise, you’re less likely to be productive, creative or focused, the experts say, making it likely your work could suffer.

专家表示，夜间不安、身体疼痛或两者都意味着在工作方面，你的工作效率、创造力或注意力都可能降低，这可能会影响你的工作。

A problem for everyone?

每个人都有的问题?

The most pernicious issue, however, is that all those potential problems may show up in some WFB workers, but not in others.

然而，最有害的问题是，所有这些潜在的问题可能会在一些在床上办公的员工身上出现，而在其他员工身上则不会。

“Some people will swear that it’s not an issue for them: they can work in bed, they can sleep in bed,” says Salas. “They can do whatever they want in bed and it doesn’t negatively affect their sleep.”

萨拉斯说:“有些人会发誓说，这对他们来说不是问题:他们可以在床上工作，可以在床上睡觉。他们觉得自己可以在床上做任何他们想做的事，这不会对他们的睡眠产生负面影响。”

Genetics, environmental factors, how bad the habits are and how long you do them, your age: all of these play a role in whether working from bed for a year or longer is actually going to be bad for you. “It’s not a dose-response relationship,” says Hallbeck.

但是基因、环境因素、不良习惯的等级、养成习惯的时间有多长、你的年龄，所有这些因素都会影响到在床上工作一年或更长时间是否真的对你有害。哈尔贝克表示“这不是剂量-反应关系”。

And although working from bed may not necessarily be something you can change – or want to change – it’s important to keep in mind that your body and brain may not feel the fallout at the moment. But they could, someday. “They won’t feel it right now,” says Hallbeck, especially of younger workers who WFB. “But as they age, it will pop up.”

虽然在床上工作不一定是你能改变或想要改变的事情，但重要的是要记住，你的身体和大脑此刻可能感觉不到这种影响。但这种影响可能总有一天会显现出来。“他们现在还感觉不到，”哈尔贝克说，尤其是对于那些年轻一些的床上办公者来说，“但随着年龄的增长，这种影响会突然出现。”

It may feel like one more thing to worry about in the Covid-19 era. But if this period has taught us anything, it’s that, as far as health goes, it’s better to be safe than sorry. “If you don’t have any of the negative effects, great,”says Salas. “But that might not always be the case.”

在2019冠状病毒病时代，这似乎是另一件需要担心的事情。但如果说这段时期教会了我们什么的话，那就是，就健康而言，安全总比事后后悔好。萨拉斯表示：“如果你没有出现任何负面影响，那很好，但情况可能并不总是这样。”