I live with a bunch of chronic illnesses and one symptom is that I get tachycardia very easily—any time I exert myself or sit or stand up. I’m now using this really cool app called Visible and the accompanying armband (not an ad, I just think it’s really cool) and based on data about my heart rate, heart variability rate, and symptoms, it tells me how many PacePoints I have for the day (basically: spoons) and that helps me budget my activity for the day in a much more useful manner.

For example, I went with C to karaoke for 1.5 hours the other day. My app was telling me that I was overexerting myself the entire time I was there, and I was. But I wanted to be able to do this thing we love together.

So the next day, when I did my morning check-in, the app registered that my body was extremely worn out and that my goal was to rest. The app also tells me when I’m resting. It’s not always easily for me to personally discern when I’m resting, so it’s helpful to have that feedback. It’s helpful to be searching for my left earbud, feeling my body ache and my heart pound wildly, and to check the app and see that I’m overexerting myself—so I ask myself, Do I want to use so many of my day’s PacePoints looking for my left earbud? So I’m resting right now.

If you have fibromyalgia, POTS, long Covid, and/or ME/CFS, perhaps you might want to check it out.