The Fitbit One is a slightly high tech pedometer that synchs with your computer and provides you with a load of information via stats and graphs. There are a number of similar products out there that and I think they serve people well. I am an information junkie and I only recently (a decade) turned a lifelong obsession with knowledge of the world into learning about what goes on inside my body.
The Fitbit has some cool features such as an altimeter that registers hills and stairs, and a sleep tracker which was the ostensible reason for my purchase.  I’ve had it about a month now and while I love it, what I am learning scares me to no small degree.
First, according to my tracker I barely sleep, dozing slightly more than half of the time that I am in bed. Last week my average sleep was 3 hours and 22 minutes, waking up an average of ten times a night. To be honest I don’t know how bad that is or how much real sleep other people get but that just doesn’t seem like enough. Research and reporting on sleep is all over the map and no one knows all that much that is definitive.
Second, I think I am a fairly active person. My average step count for last week was just under 16,000 steps which involves being out and about. But according to my Fitbit dashboard I am sedentary more than half of my waking hours. Yesterday was the first day I actually made it to fifty percent but I couldn’t get across that threshold. The device calculates an active score and I have maintained its goal all but a couple of days but being sedentary over fifty percent of my waking hours seems intense.
That is why the Fitbit freaks me out. I want to sleep more and sit less—a basic prescription for a happy and healthy old age.