What should I log playing with my dog as?

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  • jehavin
    jehavin Posts: 316 Member
    Not that my opinion matters, but I actually changed my mind. Kinda. It all depends on your goals of logging.

    I agree with the poster who said that as long as it's 15 minutes and is a "concerted effort" to increase activity, there's no reason not to log it. I personally like to look at my "exercise report" of how many minutes I exercised and keep track of how many times a week I make an effort to workout. Even if playing with your dog or with your kids may not qualify as a calorie-burning, muscle-building workout, if you're trying to increase your activity, logging these efforts may be a great motivator!

    However, I would *not* eat back the calories. Like many posters have said, if you are not sure what category to log it as, (aerobic, running, mph, etc.) then the calorie burn should be counted as negligible and it shouldn't affect your diet in any way. If you do "eat back those calories," then you are on a slippery slope of overestimating and going over your calorie deficit, which will hinder your weight loss and make you want to quit altogether. Think of any extra calories burnt (although, like I said in my original post, the calories burnt are probably just enough for you to hit your TDEE and not any more than that,) as a bonus!

    OP, it is great that you are making efforts to do things like play with your dog---keep it up, log it if you want to, but don't count it toward your calories. Count it toward "life points" of making good choices and the good feelings/energy that it will give you =)

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