How much of your daily exercise do you log???

Heather_Rider

LOG:

dedicated workouts
dedicated walks to burn calories.. not walking to and from the car..
extreme cleaning.... for instance, when i screb down walls and on the hands and knees cleaning floors (which i do once or twice a month because I have COPD and dust KILLS me, so i wash down floors and walls often)
Extra activities where i am moving, sweating, burning, really moving, shaking, ect.. playing basket ball with the kids for 20 minutes, etc. Something "extra" i wouldnt normally do every day...

DO NOT LOG: preparing foods, dusting, vacumming, washing dishes, sex (yes, i have seen that, and LOL @ "light to moderate effort.. really? Poor guy!) general "walking" shopping, etc. no other "house cleaning" of stuff you do on a normal daily basis like sweeping, mopping..

The only other thing I DO log that others might not is "checking the mail" lol.. strange but its a half a mile walk to the mailbox. YES i could log a walk, but its funny to log it as "checking the mail" just to see how people react. I like dumbasses who think they know it all.

Its also like food. I sometimes log 900 calories for breakfast and nothing else all day.. WHY? Just because I get to hear people raise hell that i need to eat throuought the day, because "im doing it ALL wrong" and wont lose weight that way... yeah, because you are my doctor and know everything... *rolls eyes* dumbarses... lol

cm1458

I dont have an HRM so i log 1/2 to 2/3 of the time i was doing the activity so it's closer to the actual burn.

Heather_Rider

Only actual exercise unless it's above and beyond the call of normal.

Normal housework? No. Pre-inlaws visiting total house cleaning? Yes.

Planting tulip bulbs? No. Landscaping involving lugging around bags of mulch and pruning shrubbery? Yes.

Sweeping a dusting of snow? No. Shoveling 18" of snow? Yes.

^ i agree with this also!! LOL! Deffo on the Mom coming cleaning. LOL! Thats more calories burned than a weeks worth of elliptical running!! LOL!

jhartram

I log it all... but I do so carefully. I have myself set at sedentary because I spend a LOT of time at my computer and I wouldn't clean the house or cook if it wasn't for (A) the necessity and (B) the logging. That being said, I ALWAYS round things like housework/walking/cooking down to the nearest ten and then subtract 10 to get my minutes, although I do log all my dedicated workout time. (So if I say I did ninety minutes of housework it means I did somewhere between 100 and 109).

Also, it's really nice to see that I am gaining something from getting off my butt, and on some days the computer is the only one that notices I've been cleaning.

I know this sounds lazy/needy, but for now it's what I need and it works for me. (My ticker says 0 lbs lost because I just reset it, but I lost 18 pounds with the same system before I moved and lost ground.) Do I plan to do this forever? No. When I have enough energy to keep my house clean and I no longer need that ego boost I won't log that as exercise anymore and adjust my settings. Will there be a day that I need a little more of a pat on the back and log it anyway, not even eating back those calories but needing to see in black and white that I accomplished something? Most likely. My kids sure don't notice how much work I do, and they manage to destroy most of that progress before my husband walks in the door. Some days the computer is my best friend.

I'm just starting over at this point, but within a month I will be working out 5 days a week for around 850 calorie burns (according to MFP, and yes I know those aren't super accurate but I haven't saved up enough for a HRM yet). At that point I won't eat back anything that wasn't Gym-worthy exercise on those days. On the weekends will be my only time to clean up the mess my kids made over the week, so I'll probably eat back some cleaning calories then, but not all of them.

The ultimate goal is to become organized enough that I can keep up with the house/kids/etc. in the course of my normal day. Then I will only log gym workouts and runs and whatever else, and by that time I'll have a HRM to back me up.

For me it's just part of the process, and I really appreciate my friends on MFP that are okay with that and supportive. I realize there are a lot of people who don't agree and who think I'm damaging my weight-loss journey, but I know that if I just jump in all gung-ho and do it all at once I won't keep at it. It's a crutch. When I don't need it, I won't use it... but for now I wouldn't be able to keep going any other way.

I generally don't explain my process, because it usually turns into a huge debate, but it seemed like the OP was curious as to how the other side of the coin might think, so I thought my perspective might help.

Crochetluvr

I only log formal exercise. I don't log housework or cooking or anything like that. To me, that's just part of every day activity. YMMV.

WendyTerry420

I usually just count "on purpose" exercise. And I make a note.

sarahslim100

Walking 3 blocks or more, gym. Dont count walks during work time. Thinking re logging big cleaning jobs too.

lisab0864

I only log my workouts and any walks w/the dog and goat that are over 2 miles long.

brendaschoenbs

I only log my workouts even though a huge part of my day is active and I set my goal as sedentary (for the days that aren't). I figure since I'm already given 2000 calories a day to consume it won't hurt me much if I'm under by a few because I didn't log everything.

However, there will be times I log activity that doesn't seem like a standard workout. If I play an intense game of volleyball with my daughter and her friends, play soccer with the day care kids. I wore a bodymedia fit for a year and I learned that I burn much more in those activities then an hour on the treadmill. Actually, my biggest burn was always my weekly grocery shopping trip but I figure that is just bonus. That outburned a 90 minute zumba class everytime.

I WILL log shoveling and raking when it comes. It feels like I'm dieing, I learned from my bodymedia fit that it burnt hundreds and hundreds of calories and at my poor fitness level after shoveling and raking (steady) I find that I have to cool down, stretch and then go off to feel as if I will puke.....to me that's a workout.

In the end I guess it comes down to each to their own. I know that I burn about 3200 calories a day in normal activity and mfp gives me 2000 a day so I don't worry too much. As my weight goes down and my burn through natural activities goes down I'm sure I would have to tweak it much more.

WendyTerry420

I only log my workouts (i.e. gym) since I want to track those. All other activities, such as shopping, cooking, regular walks are part of my daily life, I don't see a reason personally to keep track of those.

+1

Cooking is a daily part of my life, but to me, taking a walk is "on purpose" exercise. Shopping is *definitely* not a daily activity, more like once every two weeks, so that usually gets logged as walking.

Defren

I usually forget, and as I never eat back exercise calories, I don't worry about it too much. I should really though, anyone looking at my diary will think I am a lazy moo. :-D

moreORless50

i only log my walks that i have been doing since after i started my diet i dont log anything that i always been doing such as walking to the shops or any housework