Am I Sedentary or Lightly Active?

mkookies
mkookies Posts: 67 Member
in Fitness and Exercise
Hey guys!

I was just curious... and figured I would ask everyone else on their opinion. I work part time out of my home and part time in my home, and I really don't know whether I would be considered sedentary or not.

When I wake up, I get ready for work. I walk ten minutes to work, and work for five hours. I work in an icecream shop (I know, I know... it can be hard sometimes, but I actually have pretty good self control) so I don't get to sit down at all. We don't even have a chair, actually. I multitask a lot between baking, cooking, making lattes, scooping icecream, chocolate making, etc... so I am always moving. Five hours later, work is done. I walk ten minutes to go home. I sit down for a half hour to an hour and check e-mail, etc... before dinner, I head out to the gym and usually get home an hour and a half later around 730. I come home, make dinner, sit down for an hour or so, around 9ish do dishes and tidy up, finish any work that needs to be done, and spend the next two-three hours being a couch potato.

What do you think? Yeah, I know. My life probably sounds pretty monotonous. This is five out of seven days a week. On the weekends, anything goes.

Replies

  • Mokey41
    Mokey41 Posts: 5,769 Member
    Your job would make you lightly active by MFP standards and then you log your gym time separately. MFP bases it's system on an 8 hour work day so I wouldn't count the walking to and from work to make up for that maybe?
  • 77tes
    77tes Posts: 8,514 Member
    Definitely NOT sedentary!
  • DonaGail
    DonaGail Posts: 190 Member
    You sound pretty active to me. I think I agree with the poster above because while you walk and stay busy, its less than 8 hours.
    And YUM, what a fun job especially if you are in control of the urges!
  • albertine58
    albertine58 Posts: 267 Member
    If you're standing and moving all day at work, you're probably lightly active even without the exercise. Personally, I set myself as sedentary but then use a FitBit Zip to track my activity, and it syncs with MFP to give me an "exercise calorie adjustment" if I am more active than that (most days I am, or work hard to be!). This ensures I don't overeat if I sit on my butt all day Saturday, but also makes sure I eat enough for active days! It tracks my workouts for me so I don't track them separately.

    The mistake lots of people make is saying they're lightly active based on their 1-3 workouts a week (but a sedentary lifestyle otherwise), and THEN they go and track those workouts separately as exercise and eat back the calories. Nope- either set your activity level to include your exercise and DON'T track exercise separately, or set your baseline activity level as your normal life minus your workouts. For you, lightly active sounds good to me though!
  • GingerLolita
    GingerLolita Posts: 738 Member
    It sounds like you're you're lightly active. But your body will tell you more than anyone else can. I had my activity level set at lightly active, but I was constantly hungry, and I realized soon that I was underestimating the amount of physical activity I do, so I changed it to active. If I'm less active for a couple days or weeks, I notice that I don't feel the need to consume as much.
  • mkookies
    mkookies Posts: 67 Member
    Thanks for the input, guys! You've been a big help. :)

Categories