CLEVELAND — A local mechanical engineer, 33, has confirmed to reporters that, per data collected over the past six months using a wrist-worn fitness tracker he purchased in April, he now burns significantly more calories brushing his teeth every morning than he does during sexual intercourse with his wife.
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The engineer, who was initially unaware of the discrepancy, said the finding emerged during what he described as “a routine review” of his weekly fitness data.
“I was just, like, looking at the numbers,” the engineer said Wednesday, standing in his kitchen. “You know, seeing what my active minutes were. And I noticed that on Tuesday morning, I had burned twenty-two calories brushing my teeth. And then on Tuesday night, I had burned eleven calories, um, doing the other thing. And I thought — that seems low. Let me look at the week. And I did. And it wasn’t better.”
He paused.
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“The tracker is a Garmin,” he added. “It’s very accurate.”
The engineer, who has been married to his wife for four years, said the finding had prompted what he described as “a period of really honest self-reflection.”
“I’ve always been quick,” he said. “I know that. My wife knows that. It’s not, like, a secret in our marriage. What I did not know, until Tuesday, was that the whole event, from start to finish, was burning fewer calories than brushing my teeth. Which takes me two minutes. On a good day.”
He was asked how long the sexual encounters, on average, take.
He looked at his hands.
“Less than that,” he said.
The engineer’s tracker, per direct examination by this reporter, has logged the following average caloric expenditure over the past twenty-four sexual encounters:
The average encounter burned 9.4 calories.
The average toothbrushing burned 21.6 calories.
The highest single caloric burn from a sexual encounter in the tracked period was 17 calories, occurring during an April encounter that the engineer recalled with what he described as “some real pride.”
The lowest, occurring in late June, was 4 calories.
“That was a bad one,” the engineer said quietly.
His wife, when reached for comment, was aware of the data.
“He showed me the spreadsheet,” she said. “He made a spreadsheet. He color-coded it. He walked me through it. He said, honey, I want to be transparent with you about something I’ve been noticing. And I sat down. And I read it. And I said, I appreciate you sharing this with me.“
She paused.
“I already knew,” she added.
She was asked to elaborate.
“I have been present for all of these,” she said. “I have been an active participant, in most cases. I was aware. I did not need a Garmin to tell me. I have my own internal Garmin. It’s called knowing what’s going on in my own body. It has been reporting this data to me for four years. Free of charge.”
She was asked whether she found the situation distressing.
She thought about this for a long time.
“I love my husband,” she said finally. “He is a wonderful husband. He is a wonderful partner. He is thoughtful and kind and, in general, present. The physical portion of our marriage is what it is. It is quick. It has always been quick. I have made peace with it. What I did not know, until this week, was that he was going to make a spreadsheet about it.”
She paused.
“That is a new development,” she added.
The engineer has, per his own account, begun exploring interventions.
“I’ve been reading up,” he said. “There are exercises. There are, like, breathing techniques. There are, apparently, creams. I don’t want to go on medication. I feel like medication is a big step. But I want to close the gap. I want the sex to burn at least as many calories as the toothbrushing. That’s my goal for the next six months. I’ve made a chart.”
He was asked whether he thought this was the right framing for the situation.
He considered the question.
“What do you mean,” he said.
He was asked whether his wife might benefit less from a metric-driven improvement plan and more from, for example, an extended encounter regardless of caloric output.
He nodded slowly.
“Yeah,” he said. “Yeah, that could also be a goal.”
He was asked whether that goal was on the chart.
“No,” he said.
He paused.
“But I could add it,” he said.
The engineer’s instincts, per his wife, have been a defining feature of the marriage for its entire duration.
“He solves problems,” she said. “That’s what he does. He sees a problem, and he approaches it with data, and he builds a spreadsheet, and he tracks the progress. It is one of the things I love about him. It is also, in this specific instance, not quite what I need. What I need is for him to stop tracking and start, you know, not being quick. But he cannot separate those two things. In his mind, tracking is solving. If he can measure it, he can improve it. The idea that some things are improved by being felt rather than measured — this is a foreign concept to my husband.”
She paused.
“He tracked our anniversary dinner last year,” she added. “He tracked the calories. He tracked the time. He tracked, at one point, how long I laughed at his jokes.”
She looked out the window.
“He is a wonderful man,” she said again.
The engineer, at press time, was preparing to brush his teeth. He had, sources confirmed, made a small note in his phone to compare tonight’s toothbrushing burn with tonight’s expected encounter. He was, sources also confirmed, cautiously optimistic that the gap might narrow.
His wife, sources further confirmed, was drawing a bath.
She had, sources additionally confirmed, no expectations.
She had, sources finally confirmed, brought a book.