Choosing Level of Activity
 

I'm having a hard time deciding on my level of activity. I chose 'seated with some movement' as my activity level for a while, but now I'm wondering if I should have just chose 'seated all day'.

Usually I'm on my computer most of the day, but I do get up to go prepare food, do light cleaning(dishes, make bed etc) bathroom trips, and my usual daily trip to the market which is about a 15 minute walk round trip. These activities I usually don't log when I have seated with no movement, unless they take me 30 minutes or more, though I do log my walk to the market. My question is: I'm seated at my computer an average of 8-12 hours a day with maybe 2 hours of activity. So, should I choose seated all day, and record any activity or should I choose seated with some movement and not record activity unless it exceeds 30 minutes?

I'm basing my caloric intake off of how many calories I burn a day, and I noticed if I'm 'seated all day' my calories burned drops to about 1800, where as if I'm 'seated with some movement' it increases to about 2200 average a day. So because I thought it was 2200 average a day I'm allowing myself to eat 1500 calories, rather than sticking closer to 1200....but if I'm actually only burning 1800 a day average yet eating 1500, you see the problem..there's not much of a deficit between eaten and burned for the week..only 300 calories a day deficit..which makes 2100 a week which doesn't even equal a pound.

Any advice would be very helpful. I do record sleep every day too...

Thank You!!!

Really, these "lifestyles" are all estimates. Every body is different and you have to find the one that works best for you. I, too, spend my days in front of a computer with some getting up and walking around (which I try to do as often as possible) so use "seated with some movement".

I do add 8 hours of sleep every day and also add my exercise. For me, this makes the "math" come out pretty close to reality. My burn is around 2800 to 3000 depending upon my exercise for the day and my intake is around 1500 to 1600 which makes my estimated loss around 2.5 to 2.8 pounds a week.

My actual average weekly loss is around 2.75 so pretty darned close!

I do like fairly large calorie deficits just for the reasons you mention. Also, at best, calorie intake and burn are estimates and a razor-thin daily deficit can easily turn into no deficit at all.

If you can comfortably keep at least a 500 cal a day deficit (1,000 is even better) than I think you'd see good results. Of course, you may need to do some fine tuning and your calorie mix may also have some effect on your rate of loss.

Regards,
Michael

Thanks for answering. About how many hours a day do you average seated? Your losses are really awesome! I'm trying to bring mine to about 2lbs a week but no less than 1 lb. So far, I'm trying to keep my deficit no lower than 850 a day, so learning that I may be burning hardly anything extra is disappointing. I guess I'll try to keep my calories around 1200 this week with the 'seated' as my activity level and see how that goes. If I have too big of a loss by comparison I'll know that I can choose the other activity level.

Thanks much for your response:)

I am trying to change my activity level on the profile part, but the calories it says I burn remains the exact same. Even though I have lost over 20 lbs so far, the number will not change. Does anyone know how to update this? Thanks

Hi Zilla,
Have you changed your profile weight? I'm not sure, but I think that is where the calculation is made from.

As far as which activity level to use, Micheal is right, it takes some experimentation to figure out what seems to fit your metabolism. I do suggest that you err on the side of less activity, however. I found that even though I sit, jump up, stand, pace, walk from office to lab and around the compound quite a bit, "seated all day" works pretty well for me. I suspect if I added sleep to my activity "seated with some activity" would work too - but that seems like too much work :D

I'd also like to say that whether or not you use the Mifflin or the Harris-Benedict for the base line matters a lot. Harris-Benedict was derived using younger (down to 15 years) test subjects than the Mifflin. Younger people should use HBE and older should Mifflin!

You're suppose to include sleep? Will it let you go back to previous days and add in your sleep? I've just been logging for 3 days now.

I include sleep, I find it to be more accurate when I do. Yes, you can go back and log it.

Hello, why are we sappose to include sleep? Shouldn't that be included in the equation already? I don't really understand how these estimates are made. Does any one have a clear explanation. I'm new to this.

Technically, the FitDay program accounts for sleep, so it is included. However, a number of us, in practice, find it's more accurate to add in our sleep; the numbers match up better to the actual results in terms of calories burned and weight loss.

I was just coming on here to ask about this same problem... I've been using Fitday for about 3 months and it never occurred to me I would need to log the time I'm asleep!

I walk at least 10 miles a week to and from work, when I'm at work I'm standing or walking around for at least 20 hours a week, and some of the time involves heavy lifting or carrying, add to that the mountains of grocery shopping I carry home on foot every week - but for some reason I didn't feel comfortable selecting even 'mostly seated/some movement' as I felt the calories it allowed me were too high, so I've been choosing 'seated all day' but felt that was just a smidge low plus clearly I'm NOT seated all day. Now I know why! Fitday could do with adjusting their calculations a bit better if we're all having the same kind of problem, it seems silly to have to log sleep when you're not meant to, or have to choose the wrong activity level.