1,000 Days Health Tracking... It Ruined My Life

The dark truth of using wearables, fitness trackers, and sleep trackers. Why you should be careful before you buy one. I share my journey of owning health trackers over the past 4-5 years.

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#fitnesstracker #sleeptracker #healthtech

** Timecodes **
00:00 - 1000 Days Health Tracking
00:17 - When It All Started
02:01 - Dangers of Having a Wearable Device
02:53 - Sleep Stages Obsession
04:08 - HRV Obsession
04:57 - Recovery And Readiness Obsession
07:19 - Good Things About Having a Wearable Device
08:39 - Stand Alerts
09:00 - Lack of Exercise Warning
09:50 - Illness Detection
10:48 - Clean Your Wearables Devices
11:39 - Final Thoughts

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[christianewerner]

I think I’m in phase 3: I use it for tracking my sports and I sometimes check my heart rate at night, but I’m going to renew my subscriptions when they finish. And I don’t care about closing my rings or getting my steps in when I don’t feel like you doing it. I just listen to my body.

[danicalo]

I wore an Apple Watch for years — since the first Apple Watch was released — and then I wore an Oura ring for years (both versions 1 and 2). All until late last year when I realized one day that I didn't actually want or need any of the information they tracked — mostly because I felt like all the data pointed to: just do the common sense thing that is obviously good for you (or: everything my mom told me to do for my health is mostly correct). Like: drink less, eat less processed food, drink more water, go for a walk, eat more vegetables, go to sleep earlier, take a warm shower/bath at night, etc etc. I agree with your assessment in this video — the data is interesting at first, and it's fun to quantify your daily life, but it's also a fine line between using wearables for guidance vs. letting them take over your life.

[cjuan]

Very good information. I am planning on buying a health tracking watch to track my running but I never thought about how metrics can have a negative effect on the psyche. Great content!

[johnproxov]

Just saw a bunch of videos. Quality stuff man, very insightful and straight to the point.

[MrBananaWaffles]

This was solid, realistic advice. The illness detection has been big for me. I had a similar experience as Shervin regarding detecting the beginning of my Covid case about 12 hrs earlier than any noticeable symptoms. In general, the illness detection capability (i.e., high resting heart rate and poor HRV without any other obvious explanation) helps me understand when not to overexert myself prior to the onset of more obvious symptoms, which makes recovery faster.

[TheishDad]

Thanks for this very honest overview about the experience you have with wearables and health devices.

[braer]

Solid, thoughtful and accurate account. Too many times people that don’t actually wear these devices give reasons why you shouldn’t and….. they just don’t have any clue. Once sleep tracking became a part of Apple Watch. And then the ultra with the better battery. I realized I wasn’t taking mine off for more than 30minutes at a time. Your wrist definitely needs to breathe eventually. That and the ocean band and I was developing a rash. So now I’m making sure I take it off, wash my wrist and letting my wrist breathe multiple times a day. And have been letting it stay off the wrist most nights.

[lukeharris]

Once again ANOTHER GREAT VIDEO. Thank you. I am about one year into the three year journey that you have outlined in this video. I have both dedicated health/fitness trackers and smartwatches. This is great information. I’m now starting to eat differently and have now started to sleep better. Behaviour changes are definitely happening to me.

[AndrewMcNairRatcliff]

Great advice!
My Garmin Fenix watch helped me figure out how to improve my sleep - biggest improvement after I cut out alcohol and eating later than 6pm.
But I later found that I was a little too interested in my sleep and HRV numbers and I think those numbers started effecting how I felt. So I recently started to check my numbers less frequently; curious to see how it goes!

[blazeplacid]

This is exactly what happened to me.I wore my Garmin Fenix all the time. I read way too far into the data and it caused me to feel like a failure when I didn't get the "right" amount of sleep or if I was 30 seconds slower on runs or any other metric.
Now I use an Apple Watch. I don't wear it to sleep and I don't use it to track walks/runs/cycling. I just wear it.
I'm much happier now

[selimcanpolat]

Wow, the timing of this video is just perfect. I decided to ditch my Ultra 2 today because I have been overwhelmed with the constant feedback from both the activity rings and the Health app. I realized I was not doing anything productive with the data provided; I already know when I get a good night’s sleep. I don’t need to be reminded about slight fluctuations in my resting heart rate or HRV. Maybe it’s just me, but I am not gonna keep doing the wearables thing after 2 years.

[Jos-P]

Thanks so much Shervin for another insightful and honest assessment of devices, (and of yourself!! 😊)
I watch your videos about the pros and cons of various devices. I’m currently using Apple Watch for workouts and Oura ring for all day. They don’t pick up everything. Like I was injured and Oura was telling me to go for it. How could it know? And it didn’t. I love you advice about how to be informed, but make your own decisions. Thanks again.

[Belgarathe]

Love the video. Always obsessed with data and agree with your points in the danger of obsessing over it. My suggestion is use it as a baseline of how your body is. Then go out and do some activities. See how much you improved after a couple of weeks or how much you decrease as you sit of sofa. It’s a way of tracking what works and progress made. But hey whatever gets you out and moving is a plus in my books.

[SteveBIRK]

I relate to this video a lot. I used to use the Whoop and Apple Watch. More recently I just listen to my body more and just let that be my guide. I still look at the Apple Watch data but more infrequently to see trends.

[Bodzio]

I’m using an Apple Watch for last 6 years. Still with the same watch AW4. Next week I’m getting AW10 or ultra and I don’t need any more devices because AW covers all my bases and trained me to half marathon I run next week.

[LGTVQHD]

same here with sleep analysis, i just look at my night time HRV, resting heart rate and how long i slept, that's it.
same with recovery, sometimes after a run it shows 70+ hours of recovery, does it stop me from strength training the next day? NOPE.

[ZwiftDude]

Still on a second hand Apple Watch 4. I did see your older Garmin watch video after considering this item and you were absolutely on point about it probably being parked after an event and it being overkill for most people unless they were serious. Keeping my Apple Watch has allowed me to at least track the most important metrics I need and integrate with gymkit equipment when I am on them etc. Moreover.... I go back to my main goal to work out for the pleasure rather than competing and Apple ticks that box for me.

[jcmuscle]

I just use my garmin to track calories, gives me an estimated so I can get lean “easier”, and that’s it, sleep if I’m tired next day I need better sleep

[JaredPerez-hqhf]

I'm absolutely loving my Forerunner 965 week one rn. Enjoying it waaaay more than my Apple watch.

[fistofsteel]

Garmin watch user here, I mainly wear it for sleep as an alarm and running. Every other times I’m wearing a watch, which in itself is a whole other obsession 😅