"Normal Daily Activities", please help me define mine.

ladyofivy

I was just discussing this with my husband the other night. As you all know, when you signed up for MFP, you were asked to fill out a little profile about yourself. One of the questions goes as follows:

How would you describe your normal daily activities?

Sedentary: Spend most of the day sitting (e.g. bank teller, desk job)

Lightly Active: Spend a good part of the day on your feet (e.g. nurse, salesman)

Active: Spend a good part of the day doing some physical activity (e.g. waitress, mailman)

Very Active: Spend most of the day doing heavy physical activity (e.g. bike messenger, carpenter)

When I began this journey, I hesitated to admit, but my lifestyle was quite sedentary. I am a stay at home mom, and while I do all of the stay at home mom things like cooking, cleaning and carpooling, most of the time I was sitting on the computer in my downtime, and I wasn't exactly "physical", even when I was doing cleaning.

Now that I've been here a while, I exercise a lot more.

...like, a LOT more.

I exercise 7 days per week, and the amount of time spent exercising will vary (based on which day it is) from either 2.5 hours per day to roughly 3 hours per day. I still do a lot of sitting when I'm not exercising though.

So, my question to you is:

What are my normal daily activities?

Do I count the fact that a good portion of my waking hours is exercise? Or do I go by everything that I do which isn't exercise and keep my status as "sedentary"? Or maybe I should just up it to lightly active to balance out the difference?

I'd love some advice. Thanks!

takethepieces

I've put down sedentry and then any exercise I do I add it to the exercise log so that it's not counted twice as it were. That way, any exercise I do is a bonus. Hope this helps!

stormieweather

I would do that also, use sedentary as a lifestyle type, and log any specific "exercise" type activities as exercise. I mean, they would need to be true exercises like jumping jacks, or jogging (not just vacuuming or loading laundry) to be counted though.

fitterpam

I think that because you say that most of your day is sitting (when you're not exercising still) that it would still count as sedentary or at the most lightly active if you find yourself playing with your kids most of the day. The exercise is counted separately, but playing with your kids for 5 hours might not be counted in your exercise totals and so needs to be taken into account.

nehtaeh

I put sedentary as I have a desk job, 8 full hours of sitting. However, at night I am a lot more active. I don't change the 'activity', but I do log my exercise.

In general I don't log when I do the cooking, cleaning - unless its pretty vigorous. I do log my exercise, or if I go for a walk with my kids. Things like that. I probably underestimate how many I actually burn, but not by much. The cals I eat are somewhat estimated as well.

ladyofivy

Haha sounds like the consensus is to keep it the same. That's what I was thinking, too. I hadn't thought about playing with my kids as being more active. But I think I'll still leave it sedentary, unless someone else has a major reason I should change it that I hadn't thought of. Thanks, my fitness pals. :flowerforyou:

erickirb

"normal daily activity" on MFP is referring to your activity not counting exercise as you enter that in as you perform it.

ssmom

I'm a stay home mom as well and have mine as sendentary. While sometimes going grocery shopping with a 4 year old and a 5 month old is crazy hauling 2 kids, a cart and groceries around not to mention loading and unloading the car...I know in my mind that I burned a little extra that day. I normally don't count cooking and cleaning for calories but lately I have been counting the extra stuff. Like this morning I scrubbed the kitchen and dining room floor on my hands and knees and worked up a good sweat. I timed myself...roughly 20 minutes...and logged it in MFP as cleaning--vigorous effort. Because I do have my level set a sedentary every once in a while when I have a good cleaning session I log it...it counts! It counted my cleaning session today as 63 calories burned, although I feel like I burned more because I used it as a workout and put extra effort into it. But I'd rather under estimate than over.

MzBug

I don't count the normal daily stuff...laundry, light cleaning, cooking etc. When I do something out of the ordinary it counts. Like yesterday I spent 2 hours getting the bathroom ready for painting. I scrubed down the walls, damp mopped the cieling, washed the mirrors, counter, sinks, scrubbed the tub/shower and floor. And of course the throne. I input this as 1 hour "cleaning - heavy vigorous effort". Worked up a good sweat doing it and drank nearly half a gallon of water, so it should be worth something!

ladyofivy

Haha great job, Moms!

Just FYI, I don't count cooking and cleaning, either. It may have come across that way in my original post, but I actually am doing exercise during my 3 hour workouts. Anything extra... I don't log it.