cleaning as a cardio?

kshama2001

scolaris wrote: »

No. But I do count my Fitbit steps so that measures all activity, period. I put my HR into workout mode when I hike or Zumba.
I also don't count normal gardening, fence painting, etc either. But if I were doing an activity that elevates my heart rate for an extended period & replaced a normal workout I have. Like snow shoveling my deck at my cabin, or digging out a big in-ground stump with a pick, or shoveling & spreading multiple wheelbarrow loads of compost or bark.
And I try to have a spirit of generosity here. If a person has been morbidly obese and extremely sedentary, house cleaning may be a perfect bridge activity toward longer walks & more fitness related activities.

Ya, I wasn't morbidly obese when I started last spring, but logging cleaning was an incentive to be more active. Now I take long walks at lunch and my house isn't as clean. You've now shamed me into cleaning my frig. Happy?

Ready2Rock206

Never and last weekend I spent hours cleaning out the closet under my stairs. I cleaned when fat and it never made me skinny, is just a part of daily living and already accounted for in the numbers given by MFP.

lainy1979

In my opinion it depends on the type of cleaning. If I'm stood still washing pots then obviously I'm not getting a cardio workout. If I'm doing an intensive clean aka hoovering through the whole house thoroughly, scrubbing floors & such like it gets my heart beating & I know I'm doing some good. Sweating and breathlessness being the main clue! If you're super fit then it probably won't be as beneficial but to me its a workout

Meganthedogmom

No, I don't count cleaning.

This reminds me of when I worked at an animal shelter, and this girl I worked with I guess recently started tracking her exercise online, and came up to me one day and said, "I just burned 1000 calories cleaning Cat Iso!"
No honey, you didn't. Just, no.

tomteboda

I count it. As a result I am trimmer and more fit... And my house has been A LOT cleaner.

I have lupus, and just making beds and vacuuming is exhausting some days. I stayed logging the housework to keep track of my daily activity, overall. It motivates me to try harder and spend less time sitting. There's pretty solid evidence that time spent sitting contributes to morbidity regardless of body weight, so if you're cleaning instead of sitting that's already a win.

Actually, given my pedometer tells me 8 take about 2500 steps when I vacuum, you can see how this would add up for anyone.

ndj1979

Nope

stephmsj

i add it im disabled and was recently very ill in hospital. im starting small and cleaning wipes me out so i class it as exercise

thunder1982

When I 'clean' I really clean. I dont count washing the dishes, the odd load of laundry or what have you. But when I clean the house on the weekend its a couple of hours of work, we live in a house with stairs and our laundry is downstairs. Cleaning my kids rooms and taking all their laundry downstairs is a lot of steps, folding and delivering washing can also be many steps. I also purposely do extra trips to make the steps add up. I work up a sweat cleaning.

I've tracked my cleaning with my fitbit and get a decent burn but generally I dont track my cleaning as an activity I let my fitbit do the adj for steps/hr. I do find that it will sometimes auto pick it up as an activity. I had my shopping come up as a bike ride too (I shop weekly with a list and a family of 5 to feed to its an easy hour walking round the shops but the smooth movement can trick my fitbit into thinking I am riding a bike).

kbmnurse

I don't count cleaning as exercise.

elphie754

Jes_ika wrote: »

Does any count cleaning as cardio I see it as a option but does cleaning really burn a lot?

I wouldn't count it. It is built into your everyday activity.

angelexperiment

I do if I make it intensive! Hours of cleaning, moving furniture, vigorously sweeping mopping quickly picking up toys, cleaning the stairs (carpeted) with a broom broom cleaning the carpet. It quickly adds up calories wise. It's always a minimum of 2 hours. Like today I took two hours to fold laundry I put laundry on floor and had to bend and pick up each item ( 4 people adds up to a lot of clothes!)

ElizabethOakes2

I think it really depends on your lifestyle.
I have a two bedroom, one bath house, with a large living room and family room, and two cats. I count steps on "Floor day", which is supposed to happen once a week, but it's more often every two weeks or so. Vacuum all the carpets, the drapes, the curtains, the cat trees, the corners. Sweep and mop all the tile, hardwood and linoleum. Spot clean the doorway rugs and hallway rugs where dirt accumulates. Floor day sometimes rocks me over 10,000 steps, depending on how much mud, dirt and whatnot got tracked in.
I don't count stuff like washing dishes that happens every day, or cleaning the toilet, or whatever.

ninerbuff

If you clean daily, no. If you clean occasionally, then okay, but don't think it's a high burn. Well unless you're really messy like some of the selfies I see on FB.

A.C.E. Certified Personal and Group Fitness Trainer
IDEA Fitness member
Kickboxing Certified Instructor
Been in fitness for 30 years and have studied kinesiology and nutrition

victoria_1024

I have my mfp settings at sedentary so there are times that I count cleaning, but only if it's outside the realm of my normal cleaning. Like today. My kids had the stomach flu so I spent many hours doing laundry, cleaning floors and bathrooms, and sanitizing. I only logged 60 minutes even though I probably did more than that. I've lost almost 80 lbs doing this so it must not be hurting my weight loss at all! It's really not many calories though. My 60 minutes were only 155 calories and I only eat back half so it's not like I got a lot more food or anything! If I was "lightly active" on mfp I wouldn't log cleaning.

trjjoy

I only count scrubbing the floors as exercise. And I only log half of the actual time it takes me to clean. Yesterday, though, I more than likely only logged a third or possibly only a quarter of the actual time it took me to clean.

scolaris

Hahaha @kshama2001
I work out a lot and I really like to read novels... I don't have a very clean house!

PAV8888

It really does depend on your general logging of both your food and activity levels.
Log or not depending on what brings your weight trend closer to what your logged caloric balance would predict.

I have an MFP friend whose tracker logged more calories for her cleaning than 90 minutes of weights + AMT.
Based on her weight fluctuations... logging the >650 Cal was the right thing to do.

I do not expect that most of us would be able to even reach, much less maintain, the cleaning/scrubbing pace she sets.

smotheredincheese

I wouldn't normally log it, but occasionally will do if I've done a huge spring clean and moved furniture round to clean floors, washed the windows etc and it's been particularly strenuous.

GUARDiAN_GUiLD

If it's like cleaning countertops and spraying Windex and wiping windows and cleaning a rifle or rearranging shelves and whatnot, I just dock it down as a freebie/extra-room for a KitKat bar or somethin'. But if I'm doing yard-work or climbing up my roof to get rid of leaves or to clear out my rain gutters or if I have to bust some Edward Scissorhands sh** on the huge bushes surrounding the house, I'll definitely log that down.

Jonna13

I log cleaning as exercise if I'm breaking a sweat. Scrubbing floors, washing windows, folding laundry and putting it away (going up 2 flights of stairs), burning calories really add up. If I'm just doing daily tasks such as making dinner, dishes etc. I don't add it, I count it as my daily burn.