Why is housework not exercise for anyone who doesnt move much?

dragonscardboardcastle

i have been working and moving and all things related to that as well as maintaining the mess my minions make... this does not count as exercise? I feel that any movement my obese body does is, especially if it causes me to breathe hard.

Lietchi

Even if it isn't formally exercice, it's certainly being active. You can include this in the choice of your activity level on MFP if it's a regular thing!

Or you could log it as exercise as well, I think there are entries for cleaning in the cardio database (but then don't include it in your activity level, or you'll be double counting).

spiriteagle99

It is assumed that a certain level of activity is an inherent part of living, even for someone who is basically sedentary. I make my bed, cook meals, go shopping, clean the house, do the dishes etc. when it is necessary. I don't count any of that as exercise. Some people do a lot more, some do a lot less, but most of us have to do some basic tasks every day unless we are lucky enough to have someone else to do them. If you have young kids that you play with and have to clean up after, your basic activity level would reflect that. If you have a job that involves heavy cleaning, that would also be reflected in your activity level. OTOH, if you do something that you don't normally do, like shovel snow or dig up the garden or move a lot of boxes, then that could count as exercise and would be logged.

allother94

It is exercise, but it’s hard to estimate cals burned. I wear a polar heart rate monitor and will track calories burned according the heart rate. It seems to work…

AnnPT77

Even the "sedentary" activity level on MFP assumes some amount of daily life activity, such as home chores. It tends to be IMU somewhere in the 3000-4000 steps range, or equivalent non-steps movement. One reason not to count housework as exercise is that that could be double counting something that's already included in activity level calories. (The way MFP calculates your calorie needs already takes your bodyweight into account in those calculations, too.)

Some moms/homemakers are lightly active or higher, even pre-exercise, just from housework/mom stuff, though. It varies by person and lifestyle.

Breathing hard is more an indicator of fitness level than calorie burn. If two same-sex size-matched people, one very fit and the other unfit, walk briskly over the same ground, they're going to burn roughly the same number of calories doing that - they moved the same weight over the same distance, pretty much the physics definition of work. The less fit one is likely to be breathing harder, and his/her heart rate monitor may even estimate a higher calorie burn, which is a problem with the HRM's limitations, not an example of Truth.

So, the basic reason not to count routine housework is that it's probably already covered in the base calorie goal. Personally, I think if someone does some big unusual thing (swamps out the garage to reorganize, whole-house all-day Spring clean, etc.), some of that could legit be counted without double-counting.

springlering62

I don’t mean this to sound mean because I am an OCD house cleaner myself.

If house work were a weight loss tool, I’d have been stick thin and never had a weight problem.

Putting down something you’d do anyway as exercise isn’t going to change anything at all, and is just fooling yourself

You’ve got to either cut the food calories, or increase the movement to get traction.

It’s a cruel cruel but clean and orderly world round here. 🤷🏻‍♀️

cwolfman13

dragonscardboardcastle wrote: »

i have been working and moving and all things related to that as well as maintaining the mess my minions make... this does not count as exercise? I feel that any movement my obese body does is, especially if it causes me to breathe hard.

I account for this kind of stuff in my activity level. Even a sedentary activity level is going to account for around 3K-5K steps worth of movement in a day. Counting this type of stuff as deliberate exercise could very easily cause one to double dip.

HoneyBadger302

I have been trying to convince my mother (as have her doctors) that her doing some house chores and cooking (in her extremely tiny kitchen, small single floor home) is NOT an "active lifestyle" but rather than listen to any of us, she's instead tracking the time she spends "on her feet" and writing down the chores she's doing in an attempt to convince everyone on how active she is (even though there is not a single physical indicator that she is active, and in fact, she has many health issues that are a direct cause of poor fitness levels over her entire life).

Most humans have some level of activity in their day - sure, I may have a desk job 8 hours a day, but I still have to get the same things done around the house that a stay at home person does (my mom simply can't seem to comprehend how this is true).

The proof is in the pudding as they say - if someone is eating like they are reasonably active, not adding in workouts or harder physical labor than they are used to, and their health and fitness measurements all reflect that they are not fit (and they are overweight) then clearly the activity is not enough and the food is too much. Sadly, that is what it boils down to - there are many many factors that can influence what that amount is by individual, but we are at this time stuck with the body we were born in and regardless of the other factors that influence those numbers, the numbers are what they are in the end.

Example with my mother: I asked her what her calorie count was when she last tracked it. It was the same as mine right now before my workouts (which vary). I do 90-120 minutes of hard/heavy barn chores 5 days a week, live in a split level house (single, so I'm the ONLY one doing any house chores), and yes have a desk job but get up very frequently and go do some little chore or walk to restroom if I'm in the office, sit on an exercise ball at home, and I'm about 25 years younger than my mother, and have spent most of my life working out and the last several years lifting weights (heavy for me) as part of my workouts, etc. Oh, and I'm a fidgeter - there's no such thing as sitting still for me - almost ever.

She is thoroughly convinced that her calorie burn should be the same as mine and she should be able to lose weight on it because she stands and turns around in her 2'x6' kitchen cooking twice a day and does some house cleaning during the day....

I have tried (nicely, but not agreeing with her perspective) that is is obvious what she is doing isn't enough and she's still eating too much for her body, but she's convinced she is the sole victim of some mythical anti-weight-loss syndrome no one else has other than her (even though her doctors tell her the same thing I am)

Peppegal

In the exercise list, cleaning light and cleaning heavy are both as exercise for calories burned. I could tell you this, when I cleaned out the garage with heavy lifting, I definitely counted it towards my exercise for the day.

sijomial

dragonscardboardcastle wrote: »

I feel that any movement my obese body does is, especially if it causes me to breathe hard.

There isn't an activity setting for being motionless all day!
Even sedentary means mostly seated, not exclusively seated.
Maybe worth using a step counter to get an idea of what a normal day is for you?

If you really feel these "movements" are exceptional (and significant) and not part of your routine day to day activity covered by whatever setting you picked then there is an option to add various items from the exercise diary but I would urge you to be realistic about the exceptional and significant parts.

If you are finding whatever calorie deficit you selected too hard to stick too then perhaps revisit the choices you made in your goal setup?