Exercise you dont "count"
Replies
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I don't count:
-Housework
-Gardening (unless I'm doing the annual garden turnover. I have a raised bed vegetable garden and I log it as strength, lifting the big bags of soil).
-Playing fetch with the dogs
-Stairs. Ever.
-Housework
-Any walking that doesn't require a sports bra. So--- parking lots, work, none of that.0 -
I only log planned cardio (but that includes my commute when I ride my bike, although not walking to the el and back), but I do count other activies in that I let my fitbit adjust my goal, since my activity level is sedentary, but experience and the numbers have shown that I'm more active than that usually. If you don't have a fitbit and then spend a day doing daily activities that are well above whatever your usual activity level is, I don't see why it would be wrong to log that stuff. If it happens all the time and you don't want to do it the fitbit way, probably better to change the activity level to be accurate.0
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I count the following because it is either done for calorie burn or it is really out of the ordinary:
Stair climbing (and I mean, to get up and walk up and down 8 flights for exercise, not just to go to the next floor up to grab a cup of coffee, LOL...)
Swimming laps on purpose...getting in to cool off and paddling around while laying out doesn't count.
Going for walks - around the block or the campus multiple times for activity's sake.
Yard work beyond the norm - digging, tilling, hauling concrete sacks - stuff like that.
My regular workouts (lifting and cardio).
Nothing else counts, because I also did it while gaining weight.
Oh! And I DID wear my HRM to bed one night. (THAT was a hawt look, let me tell you, LOL!) Burn wasn't nearly what I would have thought it was. Probably would have been higher had I made him chase me around the house and catch me first. :bigsmile:0 -
*duplicate* oops0
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I have MFP set to sedentary because my exercise and activity level is irregular and I have a very sedentary desk job. So, I let me fitbit capture higher levels of activity like laying out pine straw last night and my warm-up for my resistance training (that I don't log calories for at all). I log activities for my TKD and HIIT classes and use 2/3 of what my HRM gave me when I used it a while back. I have mis-placed it so I can't check again for a more accurate number. I only bother to eat fitbit cal adjustments if I'm hungry - my built-in deficit is only .4 lbs a week anyway0
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When I first joined two years ago I entered some of that stuff mostly because it was fun, lol. I was trying to jog/run and did log all that. I also did some walking for true exercise (distance and faster pace) and logged that. Discovered running is NOT my thing. Quit that (and MFP) for 18mos and came back this January.
My plan now is that once summer hits I will probably change my profile to lightly active. In the summer I walk a lot but not for long periods of time like for real exercise - just to the pool or post office etc. and I'm usually with kids or a senior citizen so a slow pace. I mow and garden etc. In the winter I hibernate. I do work out DVD's now and I log those. If I were to walk for real exercise, I'd log that. I have an app on my phone that tracks distance/time/gives me a calorie count. Kinda fun to see even if I don't log.0 -
I do plenty of activity that I don't count, but I see others doing so.
Mine include . . .
Housework
Parking far away from destinations
Climbing stairs at work
All the walking I do at work
Yardwork
What are yours?
I count any formal exercise and extra activity outside of the norm. Extra housework like spring cleaning or a heavy duty cleaning session gets counted but normal day to day housework doesn't. I would count cutting the lawn but not puttering in the garden. I might spend a half hour on focused household task that may even involve doing a bit of lifting but wouldn't count it. Most of my daily walking goes towards my daily step goal anyways but any walking done when the pedometer is turned off doesn't get counted.
I've reached my original weight goal so my activity tracking has changed. In all honesty, I see no problem with counting any activity that is not part of your normal life activity. What others track is none of my business. There's no hard or fast rules. It's your activity log so log as you see fit. If you burn 1,000 calories doing housework or 1,000 calories doing something else, you are still burning calories. The important point is you are being active. If your goal is fitness, then it becomes more important that you are doing cardio and strength training which you would likely want to track as well but even that isn't written in stone.0 -
We have a fairly huge garden that takes a lot of time and physical effort. I count gardening when I'm doing a lot of digging in compost, hauling dirt, breaking up stumps, and creating new beds: the stuff that gets you sweaty and feeling like you've exercised. Just planting and weeding, no, because I do that pretty much daily in season. (Although it is exercise...lots of squats...I'm not sure how many calories it would really burn.)
Housework and just everyday walking around, no.
EDITED because I just thought of this: I also have stopped logging the calories for anything I do for 20 minutes or less. If I'm having a go-go-go day and all I can squeeze in is 15 minutes of dancing around the living room or doing sun salutations, I'll record the time so I can look back and know I made the effort to do *something*, but I don't want to fool myself into thinking I can eat more. (Of course, if you're going like crazy on the elliptical for 20 minutes on an elliptical, that's probably burning enough calories to be worth noting. I'm talking about the little things I do to blow off steam when life is getting stupid busy.)0 -
I have a FitBit and let it capture the 'ordinary' stuff. Walking while shopping, walking at lunch, house work, yard work, etc. Some days it gives me a positive calorie adjustment because it figures my TDEE is greater than what MFP things my TDEE will be. I only log workout sessions like riding my bike, the elliptical, swimming, weight training, etc. In other words I log those times I set out to get hot and sweaty and burn calories.0
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My yard is 1 acre and I have a huge garden and lots of grass. I count mowing the lawn because I do it with a push mower and I count certain kinds of gardening because otherwise I would starve to death.
I also am really into kayaking and hiking/backpacking and although the hourly burn for those activities isn't crazy huge, you tend to keep it up for hours at a time.
I use a bizarre combination of TDEE and MFP which means that I log my exercise and food calories and eat back to the TDEE (minus 15%) level UNLESS I burn way past my calorie allotment which can happen.
Having said that, I'm not, at this point, really hugely interested in losing weight, I am more interested in not gaining. I have my calories set at a deficit so I can run amuck on the weekends.
Things I don't count:
Housecleaning
Casual gardening (ie picking stuff and light weeding)
Walking the dog/normal living walking
Stairs0 -
I do plenty of activity that I don't count, but I see others doing so.
Mine include . . .
Housework
Parking far away from destinations
Climbing stairs at work
All the walking I do at work
Yardwork
What are yours?
Actually, you do probably count it...in your overall activity level which is where you should account for it.
I was assuming the OP meant like how some people count housework as workouts.
Two points - First, it is no one's business what someone else counts as a workout. Second, how do you know that particular activity is not a workout for that person? This is one reason why folks keep their diaries closed.0 -
When I first joined two years ago I entered some of that stuff mostly because it was fun, lol.
That's how I interpret it, actually, not that it's some sad desire to log something (and maybe I'm misreading some of the posts upthread). I eat back some percentage of my exercise calories or fitbit adjustment, because otherwise the calories would be too low, but mostly I log my workouts because I want to keep track of them independent of their effect on my calories (MFP is typically high, of course, I have no idea what the real count is for my weight training, and I'm skeptical about the counts from biking, which varies a ton based on wind, the bike, the path, etc., that is not taken into account in the count). I don't log daily stuff, but when I've thought about doing so--gardening, for example--it would have been a way to communicate with my MFP friends in a lighthearted way about what I was doing or to complain a bit about the activity (at least re gardening), not because I plan to use it as an excuse to eat 500 more calories or whatever. (Which is not to say that some daily activities don't genuinely burn lots of calories beyond your norm and justify the same kind of adjustment the fitbit gives, of course.)0 -
Fitbit logs for me...i only offset calories if my HRM says I burned more because Fitbit doesn't capture intensity very well
Never have i logged something like cleaning...but then again that's part of my life. for some people, it's an activity 0 -
I only count exercise I do in the gym, because that is the only time I do intentional exercise.0
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I do the same. I think I should count housework sometimes though.0
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I don't count most of it. Usually I just count strength training, about half the time I count cycling, I don't count walking unless I do it for more than 90 consecutive minutes, sometimes yard work but only the hard stuff that takes hours, etc.
I almost never count yoga or boxing, even though both burn calories and I do them often enough. I have no idea why that is.0 -
I only count strength training and cardio ... everything else is just considered life. If I want to eat some extra calories I'll go on a brisk walk0
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I walk 2 miles a day at work, so I feel like it's worth counting. But cleaning and food prep I don't count.0
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I'll change my activity level up a notch if I'm landscaping big time, such as installing trees, "hardscape", cement work etc...
I only add exercise that require me to put on my MA uniform or workout clothes.0 -
I'm not really "counting" anything at the moment, but I do log yard work as best I can. For example, yesterday I spent an hour digging an irrigation ditch for my garden. This was exercise (aka activity) beyond what I normally do, so I logged it. There was no option in the database for ditch digging though, so I just logged it as gardening.
If I do a massive cleaning, like Spring cleaning or cleaning out the garage, I usually log that too, because again, it's not something I do often and it's certainly not "sedentary".0 -
Who cares how someone logs it? If they aren't meeting their goals then they should change how they did it. When I first started, I listed my activity level as sedentary and it was a game for me each day to see how many calories I could earn. Now, meh, too much work, activity level is set to my actual level, so I don't include 'daily life' in my activities any more. I really don't care how anyone else chooses to manage theirs either.0
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I have a Jawbone, which captures a lot of my activity for me, but I didn't always. Before I got the Jawbone, I often logged housework on the weekends, since I work a desk job and did a heavy cleaning of my house each weekend. I think I logged meal prep on Thanksgiving because I was literally on my feet and cooking most of the day (and then, darnit, I did cleanup too!)
Like most of you with a Fitbit, I keep my activity level set to sedentary and let my Jawbone tell me when I've earned more calories. I only actually log an exercise if it is fairly intense (I run a few times a week - well HAD been, before I came down with the plague... will be getting back to it soon), and almost NEVER log housework anymore unless I'm doing heavy lifting and work up more of a sweat than normal. So, really, the only things I log nowadays are my runs. Yay for technology.0 -
My Fitbit tracks most of my daily activity; it varies a lot from day to day, so I set my level to Sedentary and let MFP and Fitbit sort out my calories. I only log burns for things the Fitbit doesn't track accurately -- weight lifting, rowing, Pilates, martial arts, messing around with a hula hoop, whatever. HRM estimate where it's convenient and applicable to wear one, database estimate where it's not.
ETA: I guess there is one form of "exercise I don't count" -- I often carry a 15-20 pound backpack to and from work (2-3 miles total) or carry a 10-12 pound waist pack during events. That walking is just logged as Fitbit steps. It's a difference, but I don't think it amounts to much.0 -
I count walking to work and back... but it is a round trip of 4.5 miles! I have a fitbit though so it automatically gives me a little extra to eat once I sync it when I get home from work. That will usually mop up any wandering around I do at lunch time. I don't drop below 3mph as a general rule and if I get home and there's like 7 miles... well to not count that would be silly. I'll have earned myself lots of nutritious, health giving good food.
(CAKE)0 -
I do the same. I think I should count housework sometimes though.
Maybe!
There are factors to consider. Two years ago (when I entered a lot of those daily activities mostly for fun) I had my settings at couch potato and my calories at 1200/day. Any activity of not sitting on the couch is extra and burns calories. I did eat the calories back and I should have. I still lost weight. I was not being a couch potato and now that I know more 1200 calories is WAY below my BMR. I can't really remember but I probably logged them as a reason to eat more because I was hungry, lol.
When I first started using MFP I did not know anything about nutrition or fitness. I had never counted a calorie in my life and the word macro had never crossed my mind I had no idea what it even was. I had never really done any kind of focused weight loss. I simply plugged in the numbers and used the app. I did not read these forums at all. I had no additional info. I don't really think I'm all that unusual.0 -
Well as a FitBit user, a lot of my activity gets logged to some extent. Anything that involves movement. I don't usually bother to manually log extra though.
The only exception that springs to mind is this winter I did log snow shoveling, because that's some seriously hard work.0 -
I count walks that are specific to getting extra exercise (so the dog walks where i walk the whole time at a good pace not the ones where we go to the park and throw the ball) the walk home from work cycling to and from work - because those weren't the norm in the past and I base my activity on sedentary 7km walks or rides are not sedentary
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Because I use a FitBit, it counts everything as exercise - every movement. So I have my settings in MFP to sedentary, and it adds calories through out the day that I eat back in order to maintain my weight.0
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I don't log routine walking around work unless I deliberately walked more than usual.
I log housecleaning if it's vigorous and more than the usual, but not if it's just 10-15 minutes of light cleaning. (Speaking of which, it is past time for me to do a thorough house cleaning!)
I also log yardwork. I'm surprised at the people who say they don't count yardwork.
I do not log cooking/food preparation. When I see that on people's diaries, it makes me laugh.0 -
I have a Jawbone, which captures a lot of my activity for me, but I didn't always. Before I got the Jawbone, I often logged housework on the weekends, since I work a desk job and did a heavy cleaning of my house each weekend. I think I logged meal prep on Thanksgiving because I was literally on my feet and cooking most of the day (and then, darnit, I did cleanup too!)
Like most of you with a Fitbit, I keep my activity level set to sedentary and let my Jawbone tell me when I've earned more calories. I only actually log an exercise if it is fairly intense (I run a few times a week - well HAD been, before I came down with the plague... will be getting back to it soon), and almost NEVER log housework anymore unless I'm doing heavy lifting and work up more of a sweat than normal. So, really, the only things I log nowadays are my runs. Yay for technology.
If the Jawbone is anything like the FitBit, it should be able to track your runs just fine.?0
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