When Health Tracking Becomes Unhelpful

The Dark Side of Too Much Wellness Data

In our data-driven world, health has become something to measure, optimise, and constantly analyse. With calorie-tracking apps, sleep monitors, step counters, and a plethora of wearable devices, we can now monitor almost every aspect of our well-being. But is all this information really making us healthier?

Ironically, too much health information can do the opposite: it can increase anxiety, fuel disordered eating, and create an unhealthy obsession with perfection.

Information Overload, Stress Overload

The constant stream of health data; how many steps we’ve walked, how many hours we’ve slept, how many calories we’ve burned can easily cross the line and stop feeling like guidance and more like judgment. This constant surveillance may increase stress, guilt, or shame when we fall short of arbitrary targets. Instead of supporting wellness, it can create a feeling of never being "enough."

Disordered Eating in Disguise

Apps that track food intake and calories may start with good intentions but can easily spiral into obsession. People begin to focus on numbers instead of nourishment, and "being healthy” or, “clean eating” morphs into rigid food rules. What was meant to encourage balance has triggered disordered eating patterns which in turn potentially contribute to the development of eating disorders.

Steps, Steps, Steps

The ideas the we have to reach 10,000 steps a day to be healthy is more myth than science. The number was picked, at random, as a marketing campaing in the 1960’s for a Japanese pedometer - not from medical research. Yes, movement is an important part of respecting your body and mind but, there is no magical number of steps that equates ‘health’. For many people, obsessing over their daily step target adds unnecessary pressure and can drive a disordered relationship with movement rather than promoting true, sustainable health behaviours.

Sleep Score Anxiety

Even sleep, the most natural, restorative part of our lives is not safe from scrutiny. Many people wake up feeling fine, only to open an app and discover they “slept poorly.” The result? Sleep score anxiety. By relying too much on external validation, we stop listening to our own bodies and experiences.

The Importance of Tuning In, Not Just Tracking

Health isn’t a number on a screen. True well-being involves intuition, flexibility, and mental peace. The more we outsource our health to data, the more we risk disconnecting from our own internal cues for example, our hunger and fullness cues, and how we feel emotionally and physically.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with wanting to take an interest in your health. But, sometimes, less tracking and more self-trust is the more health supporting choice.