Sedentary vs. Lightly Active?

kschr201

Hey guys, I'm sure this has been posted a million times over but in my time being on the site I've always labelled myself as sedentary and added my exercise in. I'm a student and I sit on my butt in class for 6 hours a day.

Since moving carless to a new city for grad school I've realized I walk everywhere and MFP claims I'm burning close to 500-600 calories from that alone. Is that even accurate? My walk back and forth to class adds up to 30 minutes (sometimes I have to walk it twice) and walking to the grocery store.

That plus I go to the gym. So after having a few days where its told me to eat back 700-900 calories, should I just switch my settings? Does that even matter?

kenyonsmom10

walking is exercise, if you are burning 500-800 calories a day from walking everywhere, you need to consider yourself ACTIVE.and change your settings based on that.Log your walking each day.

JDRBT

I always said I was sedentary too - afterall, I sit to work for 8 hrs/day and then I might sit for another hour before bed. BUT I walk the dog about 3 times/day. I stopped losing weight neting 1200 calories. I stopped logging those everyday walks and moved it up to Sedentary, and started losing again. So I'd use what's working (if it's working) for now. If it stops working, change it up.

havalinaaa

MFP overestimates calories burned, I only log around 3/4 of my walking time and I don't always eat back all of my calories - though I do usually eat at most of them - maybe 50 or so off. I personally prefer to leave mine set at sedentary and log some of my walking since some days I do way more and some days I do way less. But if you are walking every day, I would change to lightly active.

havalinaaa

MFP overestimates calories burned, I only log around 3/4 of my walking time and I don't always eat back all of my calories - though I do usually eat at most of them - maybe 50 or so off. I personally prefer to leave mine set at sedentary and log some of my walking since some days I do way more and some days I do way less. But if you are walking every day, I would change to lightly active.

wolfchild59

MFP's settings seem to be a little wonky. I sit at a desk for nine hours a day and had my settings on sedentary for most of the time I've been on MFP. Then a few months back I did every BMR and TDEE formula calculations I could find, along with looking at six months of BodyMedia Fit data, and through averaging all of those numbers, found out that for my base caloric information to be right on MFP I need to be set to Lightly Active.

So if you're walking that much each day, you probably need to have it set to at least Active, would be my guess. Just remember that everything is trial and error though. And don't jump calorie totals to quickly, increase to your new number over a few weeks time, jut doing gradual increases each week. But make sure you give it one to two months to be able to tell if the change is working for you once you get to the new calorie goal.

kschr201

Thanks guys! I think I'm going to switch to lightly active and go from there to see how new calorie counts work out. If that doesn't end up being enough I'll go to active range.

servilia

a 30 minute walk, even twice a day, is not going to add up to 500-700 calories especially for someone who is already at a normal weight. So I would be careful with the MFP settings there..
If you're going ot be eating back your exercise cals I would set yourself at sedentary. Otherwise you might be eating them back twice (MFP gives you a higher calorie allowance if you say you're "active" AND then it ups your cals when you enter exercise into your diary).

Pebble321

Like you, I started out at sedentary but then when I added up my walks to and from the bus and train, I realised I was not sitting around all day. I changed my settings to lightly active to account for this, then I only add in extra intentional exercise like going for a run or ride or doing circuit training.
Much easier than having to add in every 30 mins walked!