Tracking EVERYTHING?! Topic

Brink2017 12/27/17
Hey! I am just getting to using the app and I enjoy using it to keep track of what I eat. Something I have started doing is essentially track any movement I do (walking to the car, walking from the car into work, how long it takes to walk from my work desk to the break room etc.)

Is this overboard or is it a good idea? I feel like I'm getting OCD about it but I like to see it add up at the end of the day...thoughts?

Page1009 12/28/17
I would say over board! You’ll get burnt out that! I like to think of that stuff as extras... like balancing a check book... every one would spend money they would round up to the nearest dollar. Over time all that change adds up and you never even realized it! See what I mean? I always over estimate on my food and under estimate on my activities. I’m just now getting back on it myself... 6 months off... this is going to be hard but I know I can do it!

Brink2017 12/28/17
Cool, thanks for the advice. Just don't want to miss out on anything I could include. I think the best I could do is guestimate conversatively on the amount of walking I do during the day

Dietician 12/28/17 replied to Brink2017
Hi Brink2017- Great question! I would encourage you to track planned activity outside of general activities of daily living. Kathy, our Dietitian explained it well, "The simplest way to avoid overestimating your Daily Food Calorie Budget (and Calorie Budget) is to set your Activity Level to sedentary in Plan section. Sedentary level accounts for activities of daily living and that is what most people do every single day of their lives. Since sedentary level already includes incidental walking up to about a mile, I would not log 15 minutes of shopping as exercise since since it would just overestimate my Calories Budget.
If you choose to use an Activity Level higher than sedentary, then just be sure to avoid logging exercise that is already included in that level. See descriptions of each Activity Level below (this information is also available in your Plan section). For more information see: http://www.mynetdiary.com/planning_weight_and_calories.html
So to answer your question- I think you will see faster weight loss if you don't log absolutely everything! I like using my i-phone health app as a way to track steps, just to see how much I am moving during the day, however I don't enter the values into MND, as I don't want the program to over-estimate my calories. I only enter planned physical activity. Hope this helps. Happy New Year! Joanna (Dietician)

Brink2017 12/29/17
Awesome thank you :)

Tracking EVERYTHING?!