Setting my activity level

kelnage
kelnage Posts: 5 Member
in Getting Started
I’m not really “getting started” (210 days logged to date!) but my regular activity profile has changed significantly lately and I wanted to update MFP to improve how I view my statistics. Basically, I have a pretty sedentary job (sat in front of a desk for 7 hours a day) - but the rest of my life is quite active - I usually cycle 90 minutes each day Monday-Friday, and run at least 12 miles a week. So outside of my job, I’d say I was at least active. I also wear a Garmin FR235 24/7, which is used for calorie adjustment by MFP (including negative adjustments).

Previously I’ve had my activity profile set at sedentary - but I have started to find that some views of the data aren’t very helpful (the weekly view seems to be based on my current days activity, which at the beginning of the day is not necessarily reflective of my expected activity). I guess my question is - does my current activity reflect an active activity profile (or even very active?), even given my sedentary job? Will increasing my activity profile improve my stats views (particularly the weekly nutrients)? Would I need to stop Garmin from syncing my activities since they are now accounted for by my activity profile, or will the negative adjustments from my watch handle that as necessary?

Replies

  • TavistockToad
    TavistockToad Posts: 35,719 Member
    if you get a calorie adjustment from your watch then it doesn't matter what activity setting you use. if you set MFP to active you are likely to get smaller adjustments.

    i dont know why the weekly view would be affected by your activity setting though?
  • malibu927
    malibu927 Posts: 17,562 Member
    MFP’s activity level doesn’t include exercise, so you would still fall under sedentary
  • TonyB0588
    TonyB0588 Posts: 9,520 Member
    @kelnage Activity Level covers your job type.
    • Sedentary: Spend most of the day sitting (e.g. bank teller, desk job)
    • Lightly Active: Spend a good part of the day on your feet (e.g. teacher, salesperson)
    • Active: Spend a good part of the day doing some physical activity (e.g. food server, postal carrier)
    • Very Active: Spend most of the day doing heavy physical activity (e.g. bike messenger, carpenter)
    Your deliberate activity such as cycling or running should then be logged on the exercise page of your MFP Diary.
  • kelnage
    kelnage Posts: 5 Member
    i dont know why the weekly view would be affected by your activity setting though?

    At the beginning of the day, I have a very small allowance for each of the nutrition groups when my activity level is set to sedentary. If I then look to the weekly view (to guide what I should be eating for the rest of the day to balance out the excesses/deficiencies from the previous 6 days), MFP seems to use the current days allowances to as base lines for the weeks nutrition (rather than an average or anything similar), which generally it will exceed - so I just get told everything is over!

    As long as my calorie adjustment is working correctly (it seems to be so far), then it looks like it does make sense for me to use a higher activity level. Thanks very much for your help!
  • saires_au
    saires_au Posts: 175 Member
    While MFP is designed for you to add exercises on top of your job/day to day activities this didn’t work for ME when I linked an activity tracker. I would get large calorie adjustment as the day progresses, but I plan my days eating out beforehand so it was hard to balance and I’d be left with extra calories at the end of the day/lost too quickly.

    My activity level including exercise was reasonably consistent over the week so I increased my activity level on mfp to stop the massive difference in daily calories and extra calories earned. I did enable negative adjustments for the occasional day I was a couch potato

    Something you could try and see how it works?
  • RetiredAndLovingIt
    RetiredAndLovingIt Posts: 1,395 Member
    I also set my level a little higher, because I did not like the big adjustment late in the day. Altho, this is kind of a mind thing, too, because now it gets a little discouraging to see I "only" get a small amount of extra calories for all that I have done!
  • witchaywoman81
    witchaywoman81 Posts: 280 Member
    I’m pretty active. Originally I had my actively level set to sedentary, but with my Fitbit I was getting between a 600-900 calorie adjustment. Now I have it set to “very active” and my adjustment has been only a couple hundred or so, depending on the day. I agree with pp that it’s really a mind game, but I much prefer the smaller adjustments. It helps me plan my day better.

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