Everything Is Content - Everything In Conversation: Wearable Health-Tech Paranoia

Episode Date: June 11, 2025

Happy Wednesday, it's time for our weekly chat, wahooo.A recent piece in the New York Times asked Is All of This Self-Monitoring Making Us Paranoid? It was all about wearable health technology such as Oura rings. Oura rings are smart devices worn on the finger that contain sensors so you can track over 20 biometrics such as sleep, movement, body temperature, stress, menstrual cycles and something called daily readiness. They’re between around £350 and £500, which I don’t believe covers a subscription to data and insights, which is an additional monthly or yearly fee, and they promise to “empower you to prioritise your long term health goals and build healthy habits that will last a lifetime.” The New York Times piece is really interesting, and explores how this kind of data isn’t always a gateway to good physical health habits, but can for some people, increase their anxiety and unhealthy body monitoring habits.  We get into it and hear from you, the listeners, too!We hope you enjoy, and as always please do follow + review the show on your podcast player app as it helps others to find the podcast :)O,R,B xIs All of This Self-Monitoring Making Us Paranoid? Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

I'm Beth. I'm Rachera. And I'm Anoni. And this is Everything in Conversation, the episode where we zero in on one big topic and discuss it with you, the listeners. If you want to get involved in this episode or more, just follow us on Instagram and TikTok at Everything is Content Pod. You can also follow us on your podcast player

so you never miss an episode. And while you're here, we would love if you'd leave us a glowing, glowing, glowing, glowing five-star review. It's so helpful for us as a podcast and we love every single person who's done it so far. Thank you so much. So last week, Richera found and sent to us a really great piece in the New York Times

called Is All of This Self-Monitoring Making Us Paranoid? And it was all about the wearable health tech such as Aura Rings. So for anyone who doesn't know, Aura Rings are smart devices worn on your finger that contain sensors so you can track over 20 biometrics such as sleep, movement, body temperature, stress, menstrual cycles, and something called daily readiness. They are between £300 and £500 which we don't believe covers like the subscription to data and insights. That's an additional monthly or yearly fee and they promise to empower you to prioritize your long-term health goals and build healthy habits that will last a lifetime.

The New York Times piece is really interesting and it explores how this kind of data isn't always a gateway to good physical health habits, but can be for some people, but for others it can increase their anxiety and unhealthy body monitoring habits. I actually have quite a lot of thoughts on wearable health tech that I formed over quite a long period of time. So I'd love to know what you both think about this and what your experience is with this kind of tech. If you wear any, if you've tried it out, if you feel like you might want to in the future or if you are not for it. I've had a Fitbit, enjoyed it for running, wore it only on my runs. I tried wearing it once for sleep, but I found actually I'm so prone to this kind of overthinking about metrics data. When

I'm given the data, I then will read into it. I thought, okay, I'm not sleeping and then I'm going to get the bad score on the sleep. I'm going to see, I'm going to visualize I haven't had any sleep and what if I never get any sleep and what if my score's zero? I knew that I would spiral, so I've just completely opted out, which I do feel sometimes quite annoyed about because I know people that go, like I have a better understanding of my health. I get so many benefits to this and just because of my really irrational brain, I sort of have to be like carte blanche, not touch it. So I don't have any strong opinions. I mean, stronger and stronger actually as we got a lot of really, really good messages this week

that got me thinking, but prior to reading them, I would have said I was totally neutral on this. What do you think, Richelle? Yeah, so I have two things, I guess, experience-wise. One of them is when I was 15, trigger warning, by the way, just skip ahead, I think a minute and a half if you don't want to listen to things about eating disorders, but I essentially when I was 15 got addicted to the Wii Fit that we had in the house, which was for anyone who doesn't remember, it was

like this exercise game attached to the Wii Fit, the Wii board, which feels like such a blast from the past, but as a 15 year old girl, the kind of metrics and the kind of addictive nature of seeing the points go up and the weight go down is truly the gateway that got me like hooked into weight loss at a really young age and the unhealthy sides of it. So knowing that about myself, I know I was a lot younger. I think I handle all of this stuff with kids gloves because I know I have an ability to

get really hooked on the figures and the numbers and the data and it can be quite a slippery slope for me. With that in mind, I have gone through phases of really coveting an Apple watch, not in an unhealthy way, I guess just in this way of getting into running recently or weightlifting and wanting to see if I'm improving. And so far, I've not really found that side of data unhelpful or slippery. I've been able to manage that quite well. But I think it's also because I don't access the tech. I don't have a watch on my wrist. I never bought that smartwatch. So I've almost been forced to not really consume

data on a daily level and be back in that zone of monitoring myself to that degree. So I think I handle all of this with kids gloves because I know myself and I also am a bit wary generally about how much data is good for us to access minute by minute, day by day. I don't know if that is healthy for a lot of people. What do you think Anoni? I mean, my first thing is much in the same way that I've never owned a TV in a household where I'm not cohabiting with a man

because I just think they're really ugly. I don't like wearing wearable health tech apart from if I'm like on a run, I have a running watch, which I like, but that's literally just to like, make sure I don't run too fast, see how far I've gone, et cetera. And it talks to you in my ears and goes,

next two kilometers run at a comfortable pace or whatever. But I have much same as you, Richa, I remember I worked with Fitbit probably about like 2018. And I said I'd work with them, but I would not be wearing this watch 24 seven. I only wanted to wear it for the activities in the moment to like help me through because I just think anything that is constantly tracking me I find too anxiety inducing and I have coming from a history of like weighing

myself weighing my food tracking my meals etc. I just found all of that too much. That being said I find it interesting once like I would I found it when I first got this garment which I have I did wear it a bit more and I did find it interesting. Like when I slept, it would show your heart rate if you drunk. And then I was like, okay, thank that. That is good to know, but I don't need to know that like every day because much in the same way as you, Beth, it's just like, I don't want to know that my sleep's always really bad because sometimes I might've had a bad night's sleep in my body, but I wake up feeling fine. If my watch then told me you didn't sleep well, I would then spend the rest of the day being like, oh, I'm exhausted. And I do actually kind of track

how I feel. Like this year I've been keeping a note on my phone every day, just more from a mental health perspective, like felt really low today or felt really happy today. And then I'll be like, okay, look at my calendar and this other note. And it's like, oh, you were joining a period. Oh, you had loads to drink that night. Oh, you did a long run that day, that's why. So I do, I am interested in trying to figure out how things impact me, but in a slightly more zoomed out way. And also, I guess in a way where I'm doing a bit more of the action, it's like me trying to be in tune

with how I feel rather than a piece of technology telling me because as much as it must be right, I do think there's something quite, actually makes you less intuitive with yourself, less in tune with how you're feeling. And actually, I'm sure, I don't know, to me in a weird way, I actually think it probably makes you

less in tune with yourself, even though it's obviously very high technology and it's really scientifically backed and stuff. But I do, I find it fascinating to see how many people are out and about, you know, they've got these beautiful ball gowns on and they've got these aura rings, which no matter how much they try and make this health

tag look nice, I think it's so ugly. And the Apple watches and stuff. And I think it's kind of cultish in its own way, in an odd way. And I do trust people less who are wearing fit bits on a night out, I have to say. That's so funny. I don't think I've seen that.

That would make me laugh so much, the idea of a ball gown and the aura ring. It does feel culty. I think so many of these kind of wellness-y companies, especially when it's wearable health tech, it does feel so culty for some reason. There was something else you said

that was so fascinating I completely agree with about how you think it makes people trust, I guess, their instincts less, or their own readings of how they're doing and I completely agree with you at least from the point of view of I was speaking to a girl years and years ago and she bought a fitness watch or a smart watch whatever for her anxiety and she said that once her heart rate would start to you know climb in a situation the watch would give her a message just to breathe. And at the time, that was one of the biggest things that really compelled me to buy one because I definitely get anxiety quite a lot and sometimes get panic attacks. So the idea of

something pre-warning me to bring my breathing back down, regulate, sounded great, but now I'm in a place in my life where I'm trying to, like you said, kind of look within and kind of get those warning signs by myself. So, you know, knowing my body, knowing my kind of tells for when I'm feeling stressed and then regulating really ahead of the game before it gets to peak anxiety. But I just think now if I had a watch that did that for me, I would lose a lot of that ability to regulate myself and to know myself in various situations and to be able to do the self-care, the you know, looking after myself, breathing, maybe taking myself away, because something would be telling me that and I become so reliant on that piece of technology rather than myself. Well, I think a lot of people in RDMs agreed with us or agreed with what you both

just said there. We had Alice who said, companies are convincing us that we cannot trust our intuition. Steph said, I worry it's taking away our intuition around what works for us in our bodies. Lauren says, I feel like it stops us even trying to listen to our body, which I know is hard and a bit vague. And then she goes on to say, I used to track everything and could feel fine and dandy, but my watch said it wasn't. I don't know that most of us really need to know this. And it comes down again to feeling like we need to optimize everything about ourselves, which is a bit unnerving. And I think that's it. I think it is each person reports different sensations with these. And there are so many people in our DMs that said,

sleep tracking has helped my sleep hygiene massively. And then for every one of those, there was someone going, it ruined it. It's never been worse. It's so case by case, and it's not a case that we're seeing here demonizing this tech, but it does make sense to be a little bit wary of these big companies. When it comes to health data, what they're going to do with it, and then also how we feel moment to moment when we're wearing something like this and not being ourselves up if instead of you've spent all this money on the bit of tech and instead of my life's improved like everyone said it would my health's improved, I'm actually feeling more calm, you're feeling a lot more anxious.

I think it is really about your character and I think we just happen to be people that know there is a line and a limit and it probably was that bloody we-fit. I remember getting on that. You got on the board and you had to like precisely angle yourself and then it put your kind of ranked your health data which on reflection as a tween or even younger yeah that probably did some damage. So I think there are two camps of people but they're not necessarily in opposition they're just wired differently. I think that's the fairest way to read it. I totally agree. Sorry also yeah I don't want I know I've been quite bitchy. I'm not demonizing people that wear it. I know some people that love it. It's just, again, like you said, for my brain, I don't think it's that useful. And we had a message from Michelle,

which is another thing I really think about, which said, I truly believe this tech is just part of the never-ending extension of neoliberal self-discipline. We're told we must be continually improving, bettering our scores, mirroring capitalism's same need for constant profit growth. We're disconnecting more and more from what we feel in our bodies and relying more and more on something to tell us how we're actually feeling and how we can improve it. And I think about this, I remember something that really radicalized me when I was coming out of kind of like being extremely addicted to exercise and monitoring what I was eating. Someone was like, why is everyone tracking their food? You're not athletes.

And I remember being like, so true. Like, why am I weighing this piece of broccoli? Like, I'm at uni, I'm studying for an English literature degree. Why am I wasting my precious time weighing what I'm eating? And I do think that like hyper productivity, this idea that we can always be optimizing the guy that's injecting his son's semen into his eyeballs or whatever he's doing. I don't think he is doing that by the way, but whatever it is, he's doing something with his plasma, I don't know, probably all of his bodily fluids. It's like, it's all well and good to want to live forever, but what is the point of being that well in vertical commas if you actually don't live? And we've spoken about this in the nightlife episode, but this idea of kind

of balance, and I think it can terrify us to a place of maybe you're really fit and well, maybe your sleep score's amazing. But what if like, for instance, when I write, one of the things I love doing is if I'm really in like a hyper-focused thing with writing, it's actually staying up all night and writing. And that is, anyone will tell you that not getting a good night's sleep or staying up throughout the night is really bad for your health. But if ultimately what I want to do is be a writer and that's going to maybe help my

career and in the long run, a couple of sleepless nights, being hyper-focused on writing something is going to be better for me, I would imagine, than like making sure I'm in bed. And so I think it's sometimes that thing of like, this one size doesn't fit all. We aren't athletes. Everyone's body rhythms are different.

Everyone's needs are different. Everyone's like, I have some friends who can get up and carry on. My best friend Poppy can go out all night and go to work the next day. I have a mental breakdown. Just everyone's wired very differently and this tech is formulated very specifically. And I think that's something we have to be cautious of because I think it can make people suddenly feel like they're not good enough or they're not doing things right. And it's like, is this even applicable to what you do? Like if you're someone that works night shifts

in a hospital, you're in a really stressful environment and you're kind of sleeps all over the place. Do you really need a watch to be telling you that you're not doing well enough? I don't know how helpful that is. Well, we had a message from Amy, which I think was really balanced on this. She talks about how she uses this tech,

but she is maybe prone to the anxiety. She's trying not to attach too much to the numbers. And she says, I do enjoy some of the tracking features, especially the exercise stats that my current fitness watch provides. But I'm also trying not to get too obsessed by the numbers on it as that always makes me worse. Like sleep tracking, the more I think about it, the worse I sleep. Essentially, I'm having to remind myself that the stats are all based on data and averages. And as long as I'm exercising regularly and eating well, then that's all I can really do to improve. Which is a great point because it is, it's across a lifetime. Try and do enough of the things that are good for your overall health.

I think the point is when you're our age and getting slightly older, you're on the cusp of, we're still young, we're still young baby women, but it's like do things to protect your future health because it is very difficult to live with chronic illnesses. People will tell you, just look after your health and whatever happens, do your best, but don't beat yourself up. That's it. It's like a sleepless night here. That's life. Life is bad for your sleep score and your daily readiness. Having children is bad for it. Working as a doctor, all these things that do put your body through strain. It's saying, what is worth it for me? Because I really moralise about these things. And I feel guilty if I have a cigarette on the night out, or I feel guilty if I get into running and then it falls off. I feel guilty if I

stay up late. Even reading. I stayed up late reading last night and then this morning I was like, you're an idiot. You were getting up to record this at 6.30. What a useless waste of time. I did an an enjoyable thing and whether that's going on night to the rave or as I did reading my book until 11.45, really there's no, guilt is actually horrible for your health. And I think, I just know these, it's like fuel for my whatever. Like I've never been raised a Catholic, but I've got something of the Catholic about me. I've got the guilt, and I just think it would give fuel to that nasty little guilty part of me. I hate that.

Can I just quickly say, sorry, this is so funny, but I did the exact same thing. I stayed up till midnight reading my book, so I got so absorbed by it. That's too far. And I was like having an internal fight with myself. Like you have to be up at it for the podcast, you shouldn't be doing this.

And then I was like, this is your one and precious life. Reading is really important. If you're enjoying the book, just read it. So I was the podcast, you shouldn't be doing this. And then I was like, this is your one and precious life, reading is really important. If you're enjoying the book, just read it. So I was getting through, I was getting really sucked in and I was like, I'll just finish till the end of the chapter, but the chapter was so long. So I did the exact same thing. And I literally remember thinking like on my deathbed, I'm like going to be like, you shouldn't have, you shouldn't have stayed up those last few hours reading that book because you had a podcast in the morning. And I'm not even tired today. So there you go.

No, I get that guilt so much about whether I wake up early or whether I go to bed late So I just you're right adding a smartwatch onto my wrist just feels like an absolute nightmare for me But for somebody else is probably just like complete motivation We got a message from cat which I thought was really fascinating and they said I have an Apple watch which I love But I read possibly in a book in the series of the Sapiens, and it spoke about how all of our health data could potentially be used against us in terms of getting insurance in the future. I know you shouldn't lie on your insurance policy anyway but there could be no escaping it and it's already being tracked and stored. Another topic they talk about is pretty handmade made, handmaids tailie, but perhaps using your fertility

period data from those period tracking apps and using it against you in the future. And I think that I think that's already valid concern because I mean, data breaches happen all the time, we know it happened with Marks and Spencer, we know that our data is just constantly being sold and farmed and taken without much of our awareness. And I remember when I was younger, the first friend who, you know, brought a period tracking app to my knowledge, possibly like when we were 16, 17. And we thought it was just life

changing at this amazing way to track your periods. And then a few years later, we found out that that data was being sold. And it just felt like this massive betrayal in terms of the trust you put into an app with some of your most, I guess, like intimate vulnerable feelings. Cause we also tracked how we felt there would be this like diary entry where you could say mood low, I don't know, whatever. So it does, there is this kind of squaring up with the fact that this isn't personal data really, you are just kind of locating it, storing it, putting it away in this place that you don't really control.

It's not yours, it's not your Google doc, it's owned by whichever company owns this tech. It is quite unsettling. Well, it's really interesting actually, because I was thinking about this quite recently. I think I was reading a piece, it was US based, it was fears about how with these rollbacks of reproductive rights, how period trackers, and this concern has been going on a while, how period trackers could potentially be used to prosecute women seeking abortions. I think the US doesn't really have, or at least didn't when I was reading these pieces,

didn't have a really comprehensive set of data't when I was reading these pieces, didn't have like a really comprehensive set of data laws that would mean like, okay, absolutely cannot use this to prosecute a woman. And I just wouldn't be surprised. And it's interesting because that's really the only thing that I would use this tech for. And I do it similarly to you and only like, I will try and put it on my calendar. I put like black dot on the day to be like, my PMTD is at its worst. I put like black dot on the day to be like my PMTD is at its worst. I don't want to talk to anyone, rock bottom mood just so I can track it month to month. And I think it's such sensitive data. It's sensitive for multiple

reasons like all data are sensitive. It should belong to us and be protected. But I remember reading like I think when we got prosecuted, it was based on Facebook messages for helping a daughter see quite unlawful abortion in the US. And it's just not a leap and a jog to think that that could happen. And it's such a shame because these things are so valuable. Actually, we got a message from Claire saying this is what she was using it for. She uses it for tracking her luteal phase to make sure that to remind herself she's not losing the plot. She is actually just going through something. And I think that's, that is the dark side of this, isn't it, that we don't talk about. And I think it's so valid to have those, those particular fears. Yeah, I think it's so hard, isn't it? Because

I know that some people find it really helpful. Like I remember natural cycles, but they did, they obviously ended up with being in quite a lot of trouble because a lot of the people using natural cycles, which is basically a tracking app, which tracks works out your cycle and tells you when you are and aren't fertile. And so you avoid having sex in the days when you are fertile. But they got into a lot of trouble because a lot of people ended up getting pregnant

because it wasn't actually that reliable to measure temperature in the way they could, the way they provided, but just like a thermometer, but you had to exact same time every day. And if you drank the night before, whereas if you use something like a whoop or an aura ring now,

I think that you can quite reliably monitor your temperature in a way that means you can use apps like natural cycles and use that as a form of contraception, which is kind of amazing when you think of technology like that, like freeing women from the trappings of having to use hormonal contraception if they don't want to. There's so many obviously benefits to it and I do wear wearable health tech but

more like from a performance point of view as in when I'm exercising I'm quite fearful of that leaking into my already a bit like both of you slightly anxiety ridden day to day like I don't probably need anything else to stress me out. But when you think about that data it is kind of terrifying because I'm even thinking about that book again that came out about Facebook and talking about the ways that they would like monitor the way that young girls use social media so they can advertise them different things. There's so many ways that this data could be used in really nefarious ways. And we already see how people are targeted for certain things with ads and stuff. And it's like, if all of that data was breached,

I mean, I don't know how specific it would be, but it does feel, normally when they talk about data breaches, it always really makes me laugh. Like the M&S one, I'm like, I don't really care if they like find out I'm buying granny pants. But with something like health tech data, that is where you start to feel like, oh, this is getting very scary.

And I remember doing an ancestry DNA thing years and years ago and then people being like anyone who did that's such an idiot because your DNA is like now floating around something so I think they've already got me if they need to like I don't know what they're gonna do with my DNA clone me no one won that but I did the same I can't believe I spat in that bloody tube just to find out oh Scott oh Scottish is it oh great to London that's my funniest thing with these things. Like, I just know that so many people who do it just find out they're like white of some kind and there's like

nothing spicy coming back and it's just such a waste. Yeah, I really thought maybe Spanish. Yeah, my mom said it was 100% Irish. We could trace back to like some clan. They're like, it's probably, I must say that's good. And then my dad's- Did you say clan or clown? A clan, the Riley clan apparently is a really old Irish clan. They're like, it's probably, I'm gonna say that's good. And then my dad's- Did you say clan or clown? A clan, the Riley clan. Apparently it was a really old Irish clan.

Anyway, they're all, she's 100% that bitch. And then my dad, there was a bit, because he's Hungarian, so I think there was some other stuff, and I think we were loosely related to Freud, which I didn't need to know either, so. Oh, that's cool. That's got your money back.

Yeah, you've always wanted him. Yeah, do you think? I think so. Sigmund Freud. Oh, maybe there was some Scandinavian in there. Anyway, but either way, him. I think it's right. Sigmund Freud. Oh, maybe there was some Scandinavian in there anyway, but either way, my mom's genes are so strong. I do not have a drop of my dad's gene pool in me. So there you go. But that stuff is because people sign up to it and obviously by default, it means that

their close relatives have now a kind of link to it and then people are getting in touch like distant relatives and some parents are like, well, I didn't really want this to happen or in the dark cases, you go, oh, I'm adopted. So I do, you know, all of these things like it does, it involves other people and it just is this kind of whisper network. You do it years later, the data is not safe because I guess it floats around in the cloud forever. I'm sorry, I'm not completely up to scratch on these things. But it's like, we live in an era where I think it makes sense for us to be really wary of what people are going to do with our data and how it's ultimately, yeah, it's going to be used to harm the general population. I think that is the direction we're heading in unless we all kind of mass opt out or really push back because why else do they want it all? It's like, why else did they let us all

use AI for free for so long? It's because it's useful for them ultimately. And I just think it's like why else did they let us all use AI for free for so long? It's because it's useful for them ultimately and I just think it's... I've not got my conspiracy hat on but it's approaching the head. One area that I really wanted to talk about and coming in as a childless woman, so you know so much sympathy for anyone who has this tech because I can't even imagine how scary it must be to have a child. But I'm fascinated by the amount of wearable parenting health tech there is. I guess it's more like children baby wear tech. But there's this thing called the Owlet Sock.

I don't know if you both have heard of it, but it's a sock that you can put on your newborn and it gives you all of the kind of monitoring and readings of how your baby is doing. I actually interviewed Emily Blackwell, I think a month or two ago, about having a premature baby. Her baby was in NICU for a few weeks and it was really, really scary. She was born very early. She's now great. Both of them are great. But she was talking about how when she first brought her baby home, she was so ready to get this piece of tech. She bought it, she just never opened the box because she realized once she opened the box, that was the end of her having kind of any ability to trust her

gut in how her baby was doing and learn to read the signs. But she had the box then, it was really hard, but she pushed herself not to do it. And I just, it feels like such a, it feels like such an obvious place where people are so anxious, you bring a newborn home and it's crazy because in a way it must be so alleviating to have that tech available and to know that you're doing a good job but it must be so hard if you can't, you know, afford it or be you have anxiety or OCD like we've spoken about, those kind of fears and problems with monitoring health and that can make you spiral. It's just, it's an interesting world that now is developing, I guess, being able to track your baby like that. This is taking me back to an episode we did right at the beginning of the year, kind of about

surveillance and the kind of decentralization of specific things that we would normally look to governing bodies or legislative bodies or like government funded things like the NHS for. And I wonder if so much of our want or desire to feel like we are in control of our health is because it is actually so much harder to pop into the GP and say, I've got a weird feeling in my tummy and what is it? And so I even feel quite resistant to when I'm unwell, even bothering to try and get a GP appointment or go to A&E if I think like when I thought

I'd broken my ankle, just because of the idea of like, how long am I gonna have to wait? Do I have time to take three hours out of my day? If I call the GP, are they gonna call me in? And then I remember once I think I wanted to go and get, what? And then I remember once, I think I wanted to go and get, was I getting some contraceptive? I wanted to go to a sexual health clinic and I arrived and it was a walk-in center

and then I was sat there for four hours and I was like, I can't do this ever again. So I think that this also plays into our anxieties around wanting to monitor our health, wanting to have all of this information, wanting to feel there's so much conversation now and even my family who are doctors will say this of like being able to advocate for yourself. NHS staff are very overworked, it's super underfunded. So, you know, if you can go in and speak quite coherently about your fears, have evidence and proof, it might bolster your opportunity

of getting seen by a specialist or whatever it might be. But at the same time, it's like, again, as someone said, such a neoliberalist kind of outlook where we're all kind of fending for ourselves. And it does make me think it does feel like we're angling towards that more like kind of privatized healthcare system and it's all just so individual. And it does just feel like another thing that just another thing that we probably shouldn't have to be worrying about in our day to day. But it's such a smorgasbord of reasonings as to why we've got here. And I completely understand people that feel the

need to be so in charge of their health, but it also is another class divide thing. This technology, as we said, right at the top is really expensive. It's an upkeep thing. It's not like you just buy it once. There's subscription models to pay for. I use a running app, which is a monthly costly thing. When you add up how much we pay for things that potentially shouldn't really cost any money. I was talking about this, sorry, it's a really long round, but I'm almost done. Talking about this with my friend who had a baby and we were just saying how expensive it is to have a baby and how mad that is, because really if you're able to breastfeed and whatever else, kind of having a baby almost

shouldn't really cost that much money. And it's so expensive. It's just like the tax on living now is extortioner. Going to sleep, there's a price on knowing how well you slept. And I think when you frame it like that, it does end up feeling quite dystopian and also just quite sad that we're all feeling this way, that we need to do this.

Yeah, to me it feels like tech, which is helpful in specific circumstances and people list them in RTMs like people trying to get pregnant, other people going through health stuff where they know that the numbers will make it a lot easier to advocate and to say, okay, my blood pressure keeps dropping even though I've eaten, my sleep is terrible, here's the data. A few other people giving really sound reasoning why it's been helpful and why it would be helpful. But it feels like, yeah, mass adoption of specific tech with a view to surviving in an increasingly isolated, really difficult world to live in, really deprived in terms of

the services we've got available. I think that's definitely the one side of it. And then on the other side, which I think is quite an antisocial behavior is, and they mentioned this in the piece, is people kind of sharing their data online to kind of be like, look how well I'm doing. And they quote the, I think it's Aura top scientist. I think it's like their, I think it's, oh, their vice president of science basically says, this is not designed to be shared. This is personal data, which is not, it's not for you to post to me like, look how good my stats are. But then obviously in this gamified, look at me, look at me type internet that we're on, I think we can't expect that people won't post them. And then the minute someone does, it's a snowball effect of people going, oh, okay, mine aren't as good as yours. And then you're

worried. And I've seen, I don't see it so often because I'm not so in the fitness spaces, but I've definitely seen people be like, and look at my stats after this run, that's how good I'm doing. Look at my sleep. And often it's to sell other things. It's like, here's quantitative evidence that taking this gummy will help you sleep. Look at my fitness tracker. It's so, there's so many little nefarious ways, which just on the surface feel like,

ugh, fine, it's a bit techy. But actually, I think they're really dark. And I think that kind of stuff, that gamifying of health, that's what we have to potentially look out for, especially in like a really ableist society, is people kind of going like, here's my worth on a little, on a little disc-y screen. I wanted to add, I don't know which app this is on,

but on some of the podcasts I listen to, I've heard people talk about this where it'll tell you like your age as according to like how fit you are. Your health age. Yeah, so they'll be like, oh my God, I'm 40, but my health age is 12 or whatever. And everyone's kind of competing. And I was listening to a podcast the other day and one person said, you know, I'm five years younger than it says. And the other person was like, that's not very good. And I was thinking, we have lost the plot. Like this is, this is, this is really wild. And I think those kinds of things, especially what kind of a metric is that? I don't really get the usefulness of that. And as I said, there are people that probably find this really helpful. And I know that also, yeah, again, with like, it's so weird, because the things that

I think are probably, it's really useful for are also the bits that feel quite hands made to tell and dark. But I think that was just because those two things go hand in hand. But yeah, the kind of thing about this obsessiveness with being young forever and being younger than you actually are, looking younger than you actually are. We haven't spoken about it on this podcast, which is quite surprising, but Kris Jenner's facelift is the topic of conversation for everyone. And I've so far heard so many people, both in real life and on podcasts being like, I'm definitely going to get a facelift. It's like the new thing. I'm definitely going to get a facelift when I'm 45. And I just think, I don't know, I understand our

fear of aging, but it's kind of like, it's gone so far that I kind of, I don't, I actually don't really get it anymore. It's kind of a bit too much. I think it's so uncanny. It that I actually don't really get it anymore. It's kind of a bit too much. I think it's so uncanny. It feels, I don't know, I don't, speechless. I know, I completely agree with you. I feel almost like alienated. It was like I was there for the first bit

and now we're like, I don't know, five songs deep and it's getting to the like real fan, fan intense behavior. I'm like, oh yeah, I'm not, I'm not really here for this stuff. I thought we were just like doing a bit of Botox here, maybe, you know, some retinal there. Yeah, I feel, I feel the same. I feel really kind of surprised and like, oh, like I can't believe we're getting this far and it's only going to get further and further by the time we get older and older.

But yeah, I completely agree. I think a lot of this wearable tech, whether it's also anti-aging stuff, so much of it feels like it's such a deep, deep fear of death and morbidity that it's almost, I don't know, presenting itself in all of these different anxieties and patches and plasters to just like

put over everything. And on that note, bizarrely, I don't know if you've watched this series of the Kardashians, but Kim, Chris and Chloe meet Brian Johnson. And then they also do a one of those like health age things. And Kim gets something in her 20s and Chloe beats her and then Chloe at the end is like, I'm so proud that I beat Kim. I just eat like a child. And I think she really underestimated me. So when you're when you're bringing up the facelift with Chris, and then I was just thinking about that episode where they are so deeply, you know, revealing what's in all their obsession with trying to be younger, trying to look younger, trying to meet the guy who's the face of literally doing everything in his power to be younger. It is just, it's out of control, this, this fear, this anxiety around

aging and this obsession with being 20, even though you're creeping to 50. I don't know, I don't know when it's going to stop. Are we just going to try and be newborns? creeping to 50. I don't know when it's going to stop. Are we just going to try and be newborns physically? I've still got my umbilical cord. But the thing is, we don't have Kardashian money. We don't have Brian Johnson money. These are multimillionaires, if not billionaires. If we get a bad score, we can go, oh, okay, I guess I could try and get a new pillow or drink a bit more water. They can go to the vault and get Brian Johnson's nephew's plasma, whatever. They can get all of his juices and secretions. Whereas we don't have Kardashian money. People are saying, I'm going to get a facelift. You're

not getting that facelift. There's one guy that does that facelift and he's not taking a call with you. I promise you now, you're going to get probably me, I'll get some back alley facelift. It's not gonna look as good. But anyway, we also had Lindsay Lohan has confirmed she did not get a facelift, she'd just been drinking juices. So, egg on our faces. So probably Chris has just been drinking juices and getting good night's sleep.

But also I have to say, I've been exercising now for what, like 10 years after that, literally having like the biggest fear of exercising. And this year, I've never felt more well because my motivation for exercising every time has been my mental health. I struggled with my depression so much last year that I just, I was in such dark places so often

that I was like, I cannot go on like that. I cannot keep living a life like that. And so my motivation this year has constantly just been, I need to make sure my mental health's okay. And it has been the most gratifying metric that I could ever measure my life by. And it's helped so much because every time I've gone on a run, every time I've gone to the gym, it's because I need to feel a bit better today. And then if I can't be bothered, I don't. So it's like that,

I'm imagining also is going to have all of these other great effects, i.e., you know, it's good for you to exercise, whatever. but I think when you're measuring it by the metric of like I want to stay really young, I want to look a certain way whatever, you do eventually give up because you cannot stop yourself from getting older, you cannot stop gravity from bringing your breasts down towards your knees unless obviously you have a very good surgeon which I would actually if I was rich I would get a boob job tomorrow just just a little just a tiny one anyway can't afford that so shant.

But yeah, it's like, these are all, looking after your health and wellness is a really good thing. But I think it's like, whatever angle you come at it from can really impact how actually good it is. And I've tried all sorts of everything over the course of my life, and actually really stepping into my mind and my body

and recognizing how those two things work in tandem has been the most fruitful angle. And I just don't know if wearing a watch that told me off for not getting a good night's sleep or for having a drink or whatever it might be would be actually useful or would it just kind of tip me into self-loathing, which is also really unhealthy. Thank you so much for listening and for all of your excellent opinions and takes. We love being in conversation with you all. Remember to give us a follow on Instagram and TikTok at everything is content pod and also your podcast player app.

Thank you. We'll see you as always on Friday. Bye! Bye!