Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:House and yard work can help you stay active and contribute to your daily exercise , but it is not comparable to structured exercise in terms of its specific cardiovascular or strength-building benefits.

Unless you are vacuuming, sweeping, gardening at a consistent level for a very prolonged time it may not provide the same targeted benefits as dedicated exercise sessions. Structured exercise, such as aerobic activities (e.g., running, cycling, swimming) or strength training exercises, offers specific benefits like improving cardiovascular fitness, building muscle strength, enhancing flexibility, and promoting bone health.

Technically true, but the majority of spry seniors I’ve met over the years weren’t ever gym goers, but rather people who kept physically active through walking, hiking, gardening, cleaning, taking the stairs, grocery shopping, cooking, caring for grandkids, etc.

I think it matters less what you do than that you keep it up as long as you can, making adjustments as needed.

The majority of people old enough to be spry seniors you’ve met over the years lived most of their lives before going to the gym was a thing,[b] so that’s not really relevant. The key is to stay active through all stages of your life in whatever form that takes.

Anonymous wrote:I guess OP doesn’t ever eat out…. Or Uber, or hire babysitters, etc.

Why waste money paying someone else to do something for you if you could do it yourself?!

Dumb premise. OP. .

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:House and yard work can help you stay active and contribute to your daily exercise , but it is not comparable to structured exercise in terms of its specific cardiovascular or strength-building benefits.

Unless you are vacuuming, sweeping, gardening at a consistent level for a very prolonged time it may not provide the same targeted benefits as dedicated exercise sessions. Structured exercise, such as aerobic activities (e.g., running, cycling, swimming) or strength training exercises, offers specific benefits like improving cardiovascular fitness, building muscle strength, enhancing flexibility, and promoting bone health.

Technically true, but the majority of spry seniors I’ve met over the years weren’t ever gym goers, but rather people who kept physically active through walking, hiking, gardening, cleaning, taking the stairs, grocery shopping, cooking, caring for grandkids, etc.

I think it matters less what you do than that you keep it up as long as you can, making adjustments as needed.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The workout I get from lifting weights and doing barre is not achievable by cleaning. Like, cleaning is light cardio at best. But anyway.

I am sure at Fire Island and P-town it helps you hook up with men.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The workout I get from lifting weights and doing barre is not achievable by cleaning. Like, cleaning is light cardio at best. But anyway.

No one said it is. But what is true, is that if you don’t get functional movement all day long, an hour at the gym does not make up for your functional mobility deficits.

Anonymous wrote:My mom cleans her own house and maintains her own 1 acre yard--mowing, weeding, planting a full garden. She scrubs all her toilets herself, mops floors, etc. She also paints, fixes light bulbs, you name it. Guess what? She's also obese and struggles to walk one mile without stopping. House chores don't maintain the kind of muscle mass that keeps you fit as you age, and they do very little for overall cardio fitness.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The workout I get from lifting weights and doing barre is not achievable by cleaning. Like, cleaning is light cardio at best. But anyway.

I am sure at Fire Island and P-town it helps you hook up with men.

Anonymous wrote:The workout I get from lifting weights and doing barre is not achievable by cleaning. Like, cleaning is light cardio at best. But anyway.

Anonymous wrote:The workout I get from lifting weights and doing barre is not achievable by cleaning. Like, cleaning is light cardio at best. But anyway.

Anonymous wrote:OP here. I wasn't trying to insult anyone with this. I just think it's an interesting part of our culture. Like I said, people who do this obviously have some money to burn, and they can spend it as they wish. No one has to justify their life choices to me.

But I agree with the PP who mentioned that functional movement is a huge part of maintaining physical fitness and health into old age, and much of the labor that gets hired out to other people would contribute greatly to that functional movement/fitness. Most white collar professionals spend the majority of their day sitting at a desk, looking at a computer, which is pretty terrible for your fitness. So yes, they have to work out (pretty aggressively) to undo the negatives of that lifestyle. So they are spending some of the money they earn doing this work to undo the negative impacts of the work. Then on top of that, many of the activities they could be doing that would be beneficial to their bodies, get hired out to others. It is a strange arrangement. It sounds like the premise of a science fiction story, except that it's not fiction.

Two other points:

(1) I find the strong aversion to cleaning interesting. I have felt that way at points in my life -- that cleaning is drudgery, that I'd rather do anything than clean. But my thoughts on that have shifted with time and now I find a lot of dignity in things like scrubbing floors or pulling weeds. What changed? I studied mindfulness and incorporated it into my day-to-day life, and it gave me a newfound appreciation for manual labor, which can be very meditative and satisfying. It's been a great boon to my mental health, and I no longer hate doing these sorts of chores around the house. Food for thought.

(2) A LOT of people commenting that they clean and they aren't thin, or their housekeeper isn't thin, or the cleaning ladies they see on the street aren't thin. I'd just like to point out that "thin" and "physically fit" are not the same thing, and that the confusion over that might be one reason why many prefer to hire out their manual labor and then pay someone else to help make them "fit" (read: thin). Perhaps cleaning/gardening doesn't feel like a workout because you have a narrow idea of what fitness is, and are looking for aesthetic results that no, cannot be accomplished via just functional movement (unless you're building a house or clearing a field of rocks or something, maybe). But that doesn't mean that cleaning/gardening (or childcare, for that matter) don't contribute to your physical fitness.