Missing Apple Watch

I got Apple Watch on day 1 and have been wearing it more and more when I figured out how it can make me look better and its beyond fitness functions. Life was great.

Go away Siri!

Watch started to behave differently where Siri popped up frequently, even after only a light tap to the digital crown.

When I was at the Genius Bar, the crown started to work again, but after the Apple diagnostic test, there was an issue. So, Watch was sent in for repairs.

No Watch, no problem!

When I took off my Watch and sent it in for repairs, I felt very confident that it would be pretty easy to live without Watch while it was in repairs for a week. How hard could it be? I got Watch less than a year ago.

The moment I left the Apple Store, I realized without Watch, I’m losing lots of personal health data!

Only then I realized, this might be a long week for me without Watch…

Personal health data

Watch is recording lots of health data for me, such as: steps, heart rate, active & resting calories, exercise time, and standing hours. That’s just the basic stuff!

When I add in data from Watch app, like my sleep data from Sleep++ app, I’m missing lots of valuable health data.

But it’s only data, and it’s a week. It’s no big deal.

Getting up??

I started missing Watch more that night, when I had to use an audible alarm to wake up! The Watch alarm is awesome because it only notifies me through vibrations, not anyone else, like my wife in bed next to me.

Since I wake up an hour earlier than her, I was paranoid about the audible alarm waking her up. I just couldn’t relax as much when I want to wake up early.

I was pouncing on my alarm just when it goes off so I don’t wake up my wife. Waking up is more stressful without Watch.

Ok, no health data, and turn off my iPhone alarm super fast in the morning. I can handle this.

Productivity?!

The next day at work, I started to feel the impact of Watch not being on my wrist: I felt less focused on work without Watch. Pomodoro’s have been integrated into my productivity recently and Watch is an important part.

With Watch, I would set its timer for a pomodoro session and get to work. Every time I wanted to know how long it has been, I would just raise my wrist. See only 5 minutes have passed and tell myself: “I can work longer than 5 minutes!” and get back to work.

Without Watch, iPhone is the next best thing. I would start the timer for a pomodoro session, but whenever I had this feeling of: is this pomodoro over yet? how much longer? I would look at my phone and see the time… 5 minutes passed, but I would also see other notifications and then get distracted… and well, that pomodoro session was lost.

Already, without Watch, I’m waking up later and less productive, not good.

No health data, wake up in a paranoid state looking for iPhone, and stay focused all day at work on my own. This is getting a bit tough!

iPhone safety?!

Through the week, I adjusted to living without Watch. I basically just went back to iPhone for everything, which is fine… until I realized how much jeopardy I was putting iPhone in whenever I used it.

When I have Watch, I feel iPhone is safer because I do not take out iPhone for notifications or other small things. Watch is strapped to my wrist, so the chance of me dropping it is basically 0%.

Whereas just looking at iPhone screen just provides lots of opportunity to be broken: coming out of my pocket, slipping from my hand (especially on cold or wet days!), getting bumped by someone, putting back in my pocket, etc. There are lots of unknowns in protecting iPhone!

From this constant taking iPhone in and out of my pocket, I became more worried about dropping iPhone! This definitely led to more stress about even just using iPhone. I never realized how nice it was to get most notifications on my wrist until I didn’t have Watch.

A week without Watch should be easy, but it became more of a challenge than I thought since I had to give up all my health data, turn off iPhone alarm super fast, stay focused at work all day, and not drop my iPhone by accident…

This week became very long but…

What I don’t miss…

Watch wasn’t all roses. There were some nice things not having Watch that I realized during my week off Watch.

Stand notifications

I really enjoyed not getting stand notifications from Watch. I know those notifications are my own benefit, but sometimes the notifications just come at the wrong time, like in the middle of editing an article. :-D

Wrist bump

When I’m working, I like to rest my wrists to type. With any watch on, I definitely notice one hand higher than the other. I miss the days when I only had iPhone for everything and nothing unbalanced my wrist. So nice to have even wrists when typing.

Overall

Really nice to have Watch back.

Trying to use iPhone to compensate for all the stuff I do with Watch only put iPhone in more danger, made me less productive, wake up in an a paranoid state, and miss health data.

Watch, you have only been in my life a short time, but you’ve made a huge impact on my life. How did I ever live without you??