859 calories shopping?

Thin people also don't have as much body mass to move around, and I think there is some serious fat hatred going on in this thread. When someone isn't thin, lots of movements that thin and active people take for granted as easy breezy daily activity are nothing of the sort. When I'm overweight, normal things for you (like just one flight of stairs, let alone 20) can leave me out of breath and sweating. Nobody said they were planning to stuff up on hundreds of calories of junk all justified by a walk from the parking lot to the store. Asking if a measurement of calorie burn is accurate isn't the same as seeking justification to eat it all back. It is important to not burn a large uncounted excess of calories in a day without giving yourself some added nutrition. She seems self aware of the situation enough to have asked the question in the first place.

And yes, if I sat on my butt (even more than regularly??) all day, then I would make sure to go a bit under my normal calorie range. Obviously.

Good commentary.

OP was obviously doing physical movement. That's exercise.

In OP's situation, I would log half of the HRM's estimate to be on the safe side. Then I would eat back those calories, or not, depending on my hunger levels.

Its not about fat hatred....its about whether you should log a stroll through the mall as "exercise' Given that logic I could park my car at end of the parking lot walking into the grocery store and say "oh, look I parked an extra 20 feet away I can log this as exercise because I do not normally do that"....I don't care if you fat, thin, curvy whatever I just don't think things people are doing on daily basis..cleaning, shopping etc should be logged...the OP asked if it should be logged and I gave my opinion...

Um, OP stated repeatedly that they don't walk for hours in the mall on a daily basis. Many people don't clean or shop on a daily basis either. Normal daily activity differs from person to person.

so what?

should the equivalent four trips to Walmart also be logged then?

What if the OP sat at home for four hours...went to the mall for four hours..then came home and did nothing...should it still be logged bc rest of day was sedentary?

Why shouldn't it be logged? Not everyone logs for the same reasons. Some want to have a record of their physical activity.
Also, if a person is going from completely sedentary to having some form of activity, they're still burning more calories by doing said activity.

ndj1979 - I read what you wrote, and I get what you're saying. I catch myself thinking, "yeah, it is different, walking in a mall vs treadmilling a mile or three." But then, I'm forgetting about how winded I got walking up 13 steps between the floors in my house, and how tired I was if I went to the mall and went to two stores and browsed for a half hour... It has been so long now that I nearly forgot what it was like to be sweaty and tired, feet hurting, tough to breathe... The way, you know, a "real" workout might make you feel.

I don't know if the OP is obese, I don't know how much the OP eats, I am not going to go look. I'm just saying, you've either never been morbidly obese, or you're forgetting what it felt like if you're writing off walking through the mall for four hours.

Would I log 850 calories? No. Or at least not eat all of them back (only some, IF I were hungry). But to say it's "not exercise" or is included in a sedentary activity level is nonsense. I agree OP should change to lightly active.

I don't see logging four hours of walking in the mall any different than me getting the calorie count from logging steps from my fitbit. No one is ragging on fitbit people, so why is everyone mad about this situation? Yes, not 800+ calories, but it's definitely not a daily activity she does....

Yes! Great point.

1. I'm not ragging.
2. She asked my opinion.
3. I have no idea how fit bits work or how they interface with MFP so I have no opinion.
4. No one asked me my opinion on fit bits. (See #3 if they had)

For the record - since this sort of turned into a fat hating accusation thing - I have zero idea how much weight OP had to lose and made no assumptions about that. My answer would have been the same regardless.

Thin people also don't have as much body mass to move around,

Because they move around and don't worry about getting extra "nutrition" to compensate.

Oh hey, some more sizeism.

Didn't you know, when people who are overweight eat food it is only "nutrition" *wink wink somebody wants a cookie*. We never eat back exercise calories with protein or veggies, lol.

NEVER, OBVIOUSLY FAT PEOPLE EAT NOTHING BUT DONUTS AND COOKIES AND BIG MACS AND WE LIVE SOLELY FOR EXCUSES TO EAT MORE OF OUR PRECIOUS FATTY FOOD, WE ARE ALL MINDLESS COOKIE ZOMBIES!

Now I really want a cookie!! Man, I'm such a fat *kitten*.

Here is how I see it, if I had done what the OP did.

If my heart rate went into the 180's and stayed for at least 30 minutes in that range, I would log it. If not, I wouldn't. That is what I would do. What other people do is there own business.

Exercise means different things to different people. What it means to me is anything that gets my heart rate up to 180ish and keeps it there for at least 30 minutes. Anything below that I call strength training. (Using my muscles but not burning the fat)

You may define that term of exercise differently. It doesn't matter.

If you want to log the entire 800 whatever calories go for it. If you choose to log 1/2, or 1/4 or whatever go for it. Nothing, go for it. Its your body, and what you decide to do with it is your business.

I log to keep track of macros, calories, and what I ate and did that lost me X amount of weight. I log to notice trends.

Log whatever you want. In my opinion, I wouldn't count it, but my opinion doesn't matter. Your body will show whether you burned those calories or not when you gain or lose weight.

i spent an hour typing in this thread..can I log that?

Ever heard of the "straw man argument"?

my only point is that these things are included in the functions that your body is already going to do and already burn calories....I just don't see how a walk in the mall is going to provide any additional health benefit or calorie burn when you already have that in your TDEE....

So when you log all this stuff and have not lost any weight...pleas don't post a thread in a month that says "four weeks in and no loss, help"

But MFP doesn't use TDEE. If it did, it wouldn't be adding exercise calories to your daily targets... Including such rudimentary things as cleaning, gardening, fishing, and walking. Yes, setting an activity level includes some stuff, but the OP clearly stated she was set to sedentary, so MFP wants practically everything logged as exercise. They should change it, and allow for a TDEE-% approach.

Thin people also don't have as much body mass to move around,

Because they move around and don't worry about getting extra "nutrition" to compensate.

Oh hey, some more sizeism.

Didn't you know, when people who are overweight eat food it is only "nutrition" *wink wink somebody wants a cookie*. We never eat back exercise calories with protein or veggies, lol.

NEVER, OBVIOUSLY FAT PEOPLE EAT NOTHING BUT DONUTS AND COOKIES AND BIG MACS AND WE LIVE SOLELY FOR EXCUSES TO EAT MORE OF OUR PRECIOUS FATTY FOOD, WE ARE ALL MINDLESS COOKIE ZOMBIES!

Now I really want a cookie!! Man, I'm such a fat *kitten*.

*Gasp* That's fat people thinking! Don't think like that, or you'll become fat! Which is such a horrible HORRIBLE fate! :laugh:

Oh, noes!! I'm going to get fat and then no man will ever love me!! My only goal in life is to be aesthetically pleasing to men!!!!!!111!!1!!1!!!1!

Crazy that people are getting so upset about this.

When you do an activity that is out of your norm--even if it isn't formal exercise--you are burning more calories than normal. You are creating a larger deficit. Now, mercy knows that no one is allowed to eat under TDEE -20% or the gremlins will molest them, so yeah, this additional activity should be taken into account.

I wear a Bodymedia Fit so every little movement I make is calculated into my daily burn and logged, in a manner of speaking. A four hour trip to the mall would definitely up my calories expended for the day. This is pretty simple and straight forward.

Whether you choose to eat more because of this spike in activity or not, whatever, that's personal. But no reason not to acknowledge that you burned the calories that you actually did, in fact, burn.