UP we go!

It’s finally time for me to review the one jewellery (not really jewellery) item I’m wearing all the time… Yes, even when I sleep. I wear this item more than I wear my wedding band as I don’t sleep with any jewellery on except for this one. I’m talking bout my Jawbone UP3. Yes, all of the nutritional info I post is curtesy of their mobile app, and yes, it’s the one thing that keeps me healthy. If not for my own good, than for the shame I feel whenever my food score or my steps start to go down.

As you probably know by now, two and a half years ago I had a massive intestinal blockage (E.R. and everything), so the next step was to talk to a nutritionist in order to prevent that from ever happening again. Apparently I have some problems where digestion is concerned. I had to be extra careful with what I ate for more than three months, so D did some intensive research online and bought me Jawbone‘s UP 24 (you can’t find it now as new and more exciting models are for sale). I know that he bought me the best of the best at the moment because he a) takes health very seriously and b) he always does extensive research before buying any gizmo. I had my  UP24 for about a year and I loved it. I loved it because it kept me on the right track where my eating habits were concerned and because it was very accurate when it came to actually measuring my steps. I found the app very user-friendly and very complex. I simply loved the whole experience and I never took the bloody thing off. Even at weddings and other formal affairs, to D‘s disapproval, I didn’t take it off.

Time passed and the bracelet degraded to a point where D said that I needed a new one. Yes, in about a year, the tracker looked terrible, but it still did the job it was intended to do. Since he realised that I was addicted to my UP band, he decided than when we celebrated 6 years of an amazing relationship and 2 years of marriage, we should get ourselves the brand new (then) UP3. And so we did! Unlucky for us, that they had just launched it back then and the only colour they had was black. By now, they came up with lots of wonderful and trendy colours (I got my eye on you, Golden beauty!). Boy, was this one an improvement! If I thought that this tracker couldn’t get any better, well this one is better.

First of all, the strap is a lot better than the old one. True, I’ve experienced some moments when I almost lost my tracker because the strap got loose, but I just moved it on my right hand instead of my left and that problem never emerged again. The other cool thing about this new tracker is the fact that it keeps track of your resting heart beat, which you can read about here. The other definite improvement about this one is the fact that unlike the old one, you can shower with this on. Surely, you should’t swim with it on, but it’s not as sensitive to water as the old one.

The app is more or less the same as the old one, because why fix something that’s not broken? The cool thing about the app is that when you are not in an undeveloped country like Romania, you can actually find the menus to some of the restaurants and you can instantly add the food with all their nutritional info. Another cool thing about the app is that for some foods you can actually scan the barcode and all the data is there. If the barcode doesn’t work, you can manually add the said food and if you log in enough info, the said food gets a health grade. Basically what this app does, it constantly challenges you to eat healthy and it also reminds you to et off that chair and move, just like mine did right now, as I’m sitting on this chair for an hour.

You can log all sorts of activities into it that are preset in the app, that way you get a better view of just how much physical activity you’ve had during the day and how many calories you burned. Another cool feature this tracker has it’s that you can specifically set different types of alarms: movement, step count,silent wake-up alarm.

Of course D being the free-spirited soul that he is, couldn’t be bothered with actually keeping any track of his food because as he says, it’s too complicated to log everything. He does however have periods of intense fitness tracking when he also wears it all the time. But he’s not as obsessed as I am. If you look through all my Instagram photos, you’re going to notice that I always have it on, and I do not plan on giving it up any time soon. To be honest, I can’t wait for this one to actually be broken so I can buy it again in a different colour. No, I am not really interested in buying the UP4 mainly because I find no use for paying anything with my bracelet, I can reach for my own credit card thank you very much! That’s the only difference between the UP3 and the UP4.

Overall, this little gizmo changed my life for the better and if you are a health fanatic just like me, I honestly think that this is the best and most complete tracker you can find on the market!

L.