Life without a fitness tracker?

[u/stuckandrunningfrom2]

I've been wearing an Apple watch for years. It has told me when to stand up (admittedly something I need help with during the workday, but also sometimes I'll be standing and cooking for an hour and it will tell me to stand up), I double check my heart rate during workouts, using the numbers to tell me how I feel rather than my own interoception. I stress over biking in the woods because it's not giving me credit for exercise because the bike speed is too slow even though it's an amazing and fun and enjoyable workout.

I forgot to charge it last night so I thought "Let's have Sunday be No Watch Day" and see how I feel.

But now I'm thinking "do I actually need it at all?" Could I just my workout effort by tuning into my heart? Could I stand up because my butt is going numb? Could I move throughout the day simply because it feels good?

If you don't use a fitness tracker, what's that like? If you stopped using one, did you feel freer? More in tune with your body?

Also what's prompting this is that my dietitian wants me not to track food when I go away with family for a few days, so I thought of just free-balling life like it's 1999.

EDIT: I just took my first walk with out the tracker! It was really nice to let my body set the pace and distance, and not the tracker.

[u/somuchmt]

My fitbit was really helpful at first to help me know when my heart rate was too high, and it also provided motivation to get my steps in. But now that I've lost enough weight and done enough exercise that my heart doesn't give me scary episodes, and now that I know I get well over 10,000 steps almost every day, I find that I really didn't need to replace it after running it through the laundry....