House cleaning as exercise

First, be aware the the MFP "activity level" setting, even at sedentary/not very active, assumes we'll be doing a normal moderate amount of home chores. Going too far with logging housework can effectively double-count activity.

However, once a person has a reasonable track record of loss at a given calorie level, it can be reasonable to log unusually demanding home chores. I don't log routine housework, but if I cleaned the garage for 8 hours on Saturday (when my normal weekday is a desk job), I'd probably record something (not the full 8 hours worth, though). I don't log weeding the garden as exercise, but if I spent several hours digging a new garden bed by hand, I'd probably record something.

If you have your Fitbit synced to MFP, it will take care of the calorie math: You don't need to log anything separately. (I'd recommend turning "negative adjustments" on.)

If you don't have your Fitbit synced, but do wear it 24x7 (except when charging), you can look at your all-day Fitbit calories compared to your typical day, and get some idea of how many extra calories it might be sensible to log (without double-counting activity) in cases where you do unusually demanding household chores.

There are some housework-type entries in the exercise database if you do choose to log it. Look at the "cleaning" entries in the cardiovascular database, or the "moving" ones, as possible ways to log an activity like what you describe. If you have a reasonable calorie estimate from your Fitbit for the activity, you can override MFP's calorie estimate with that . . . but be cautious about those Fitbit calories, since the calories for an activity may include BMR/RMR (the calories you'd burn if just laying around) when you'd want to log just the additional calories from the activity.

If this is a rare thing for you, another option is to not log it, and just let it increase your calorie deficit this week. Your call, though.

(Context: I've been logging on MFP through a year of loss, and 7+ years of maintenance since. I'm commenting based on that experience.)

Best wishes!

frhaberl wrote: »

There are a few different approaches you can take:
- Not sure if this works for FitBit, but my Apple Watch sends a calorie adjustment to MFP daily that gets added to the intentional exercise sessions I record via the workout option on my watch. If FitBit does the same, that would take into account your cleaning session.
- If your activity level in MFP is set at something other than sedentary, the base calories you have take into account activities like housecleaning and other "everyday" movement. Some people (myself included) choose to let that cover those types of activities and don't load them as a separate workout session.

FWIW, even at sedentary, the base calories include some allocation for everyday movement. For most people, "sedentary" would cover up to maybe 3000-5000 steps or equivalent other movement, roughly.

- You can use one of the exercises in MFP with a similar exertion level and enter a time duration.
- You can use a fitness tracker to log that session as a walk or some other activity and estimate the calories based on your heart rate.

I agree that housework can be a great workout, and can count towards the recommended 150 minutes/week. For me that (and a clean house) are sufficient benefit, and I don't worry about tracking the additional calories I burn. If I was doing hours of heavy cleaning most days then it might be worth tracking, but I figure that those calories are probably cancelled out by underestimates or errors in food tracking. Might be worth going a few weeks to without tracking those calories and only worry about adding them in if your rate of weight loss is significantly faster than estimated. I was losing faster than estimated but since I didn't want to think about tracking everything that could be perceived as exercise, I just increased my activity level and now my numbers are closer to the estimate.