Observing Ego Help Center

When you first open The Observing Ego, you'll be guided through an onboarding flow:

• Enter your date of birth (determines your age group and available features)
• Optionally connect Apple Health for mood-health correlation insights
• Optionally set up a Safety Plan (Stanley & Brown model) for crisis moments
• Learn what the app can do and how the privacy model works

For users under 13, a parent or guardian must complete setup and establish a parental PIN. No account, email, or password is required for any user. You can start logging immediately.

The Observing Ego requires iOS 17 or later. It runs on:

• iPhone — primary experience, all features available
• iPad — adaptive layout with NavigationSplitView sidebar (note: HealthKit is not available on iPad)
• Apple Watch — quick mood logging companion (requires watchOS 10+)

iOS 18 or later is recommended to unlock HealthKit State of Mind writes, PHQ-9/GAD-7 scored assessment writes back to Apple Health, and other Apple intelligence features.

The app supports ages 7 and up with age-adaptive interfaces:

• 7–9 (Young Child): Simplified emoji+word grid, 2nd-grade vocabulary, SF Rounded font, bouncy animations. Basic journaling only. Crisis → parent/guardian contact.
• 10–12 (Older Child): Orbiting picker with child-friendly vocabulary. WHO-5 available, no substance tracking or digital phenotyping.
• 13–17 (Teen): Full picker with teen-appropriate labels. All assessments (PHQ-9, GAD-7, WHO-5, C-SSRS, ASQ) available. No alcohol or drug tracking.
• 18+ (Adult): Complete feature set including STIPO-R, substance tracking, and felt-stress capture.

Apple rates this app 13+ in the App Store. If you're installing for a child aged 7–12, the simplest path is to use Family Sharing — their iPhone will route the install request to a parent or guardian for approval. Once installed, the in-app age verification picks the correct age-adaptive interface based on the date of birth you enter.

No. The Observing Ego does not require an account, email address, or any identifying information. All data is stored locally on your device. There is nothing to sign up for and no password to forget.

Yes, completely. All core features — mood logging, journal, assessments, insights, correlations, safety plan, crisis resources — run entirely on-device and work offline.

An internet connection is only needed for:

• Downloading the app initially
• Optional iCloud sync across your devices (if you enable it)
• Fetching weather data for weather-mood correlations (if you grant location permission)
• StoreKit subscription management (Apple handles this)

The app includes 165 emotions organized into 12 primary feeling categories. Each primary feeling has secondary descriptors that help you pinpoint exactly what you're experiencing. Emotion vocabulary adapts to your age group.

The circumplex model maps emotions along two dimensions: valence (pleasant to unpleasant) and arousal (activated to deactivated). This allows the app to position your emotion on a two-dimensional map, revealing patterns that a simple "good/bad" scale would miss.

There's no "right" frequency. Many users log 1–3 times daily. The app needs at least 7 data points before it shows any insights or correlations. Consistency matters more than frequency.

Yes. The Apple Watch companion app lets you log your mood quickly from your wrist. There are also Widgets for iPhone and iPad, including an interactive Quick Log widget that lets you tap to log a mood without opening the app.

Yes. Along with the emotion and intensity, you can optionally add:

• People present or social context
• Place or location tag
• Body sensations (mapped on an interactive body outline)
• Perceived stress and body activation (adults only)
• Notes or a full journal entry
• Weather (auto-populated if location permission is granted)

The app supports five different journaling formats:

• Free-form journal — write whatever you like, no prompts
• Psychodynamic writing prompts — rotating prompts across six categories (Free Association, Inner World, Relational, Affective, Self-Reflection, Symbolic)
• Dream journal — record dreams with associated themes
• DBT diary cards — track emotions, urges, and skills used (for clients doing DBT skills work)
• Sentence Completion Exercise — a projective writing exercise with 40 stems across family, social, self-concept, and general attitudes

Free-form journal entries and psychodynamic writing prompts are unlimited on the free tier. Dream journal entries are limited to 3 per month on the free tier (unlimited with Premium). Defense mechanism tracking is limited to 5 entries per month on the free tier.

A library of rotating writing prompts designed to support depth-oriented self-reflection. Unlike generic "gratitude journaling" prompts, these are drawn from psychodynamic and relational traditions. Prompts adapt to your age group, and daily rotating prompts are also shown on the Home screen.

The app includes six validated clinical screening instruments, all available for free:

• PHQ-9 — Patient Health Questionnaire (depression screening)
• GAD-7 — Generalized Anxiety Disorder scale
• WHO-5 — World Health Organization Well-Being Index
• C-SSRS — Columbia Suicide Severity Rating Scale (safety)
• ASQ — Ask Suicide-Screening Questions (safety)
• STIPO-R — Structured Interview of Personality Organization, Revised (adults 18+)

All assessments are screening tools, not diagnostic instruments. A disclaimer is displayed before and after every assessment. Longitudinal tracking and advanced insights based on assessment results are Premium features.

Yes. All scoring follows the published clinical manuals exactly. Severity bands use the published cutoff scores with no modifications or approximations. No machine learning or AI is involved — scoring is deterministic and matches the published instruments.

PHQ-9 and GAD-7 were developed by Drs. Robert L. Spitzer, Janet B.W. Williams, and Kurt Kroenke with support from Pfizer Inc. STIPO-R is used under guidelines from the International Society of Transference-Focused Psychotherapy (ISTFP).

For PHQ-9 and GAD-7, every 2 weeks is a common clinical cadence. For WHO-5, weekly is reasonable. Avoid daily repetition — assessments measure symptom severity over the prior two weeks (or prior fortnight for WHO-5), so daily retaking isn't meaningful. If you're in treatment, follow your clinician's guidance.

Absolutely. You can show your therapist the Insights Dashboard or the "Show Your Doc" report directly on your phone, or export your data as a PDF report from Settings → Data Management → Export Data. Premium users can also generate a Clinical Formulation Report for session review.

With your explicit permission, the app reads the following HealthKit data types for mood-health correlation insights:

• Heart rate, resting heart rate, and heart rate variability (HRV)
• Heart rate recovery (one-minute)
• Blood pressure (systolic and diastolic)
• Respiratory rate
• Sleep analysis (duration and sleep stages)
• Wrist temperature (sleeping)
• Step count, walking speed, flights climbed, and Apple Stand Time
• Active energy burned and Apple Exercise Time
• VO₂ max
• Time in daylight (iOS 17+)
• Body mass, body fat percentage, and lean body mass

You control which data types the app can access. HealthKit data stays on your device and is never transmitted anywhere.

On iOS 18 or later, the app can optionally write the following to HealthKit if you grant permission:

• State of Mind entries when you complete a mood log
• PHQ-9 scored assessments when you complete a PHQ-9
• GAD-7 scored assessments when you complete a GAD-7

These writes are optional and entirely user-controlled. They let your mood and assessment data appear in the Apple Health app alongside your other health data.

Apple's HealthKit framework is not supported on iPadOS — this is a platform limitation, not a decision by the app. If you use both an iPhone and an iPad, your HealthKit-based insights are computed on your iPhone and will sync to iPad via iCloud (if sync is enabled).

Go to iPhone Settings → Privacy & Security → Health → The Observing Ego. Toggle off any data types you no longer want the app to access. You can re-enable them at any time.

The app requires a minimum of 7 data points before showing any insight or correlation. This prevents misleading conclusions from small samples. Only correlations with |r| ≥ 0.3 (moderate or stronger) are surfaced. Keep logging and insights will appear once you have enough data.

The app always says "associated with" and never "causes." A correlation means two things tend to occur together — it does not mean one causes the other. For example, "better mood is associated with 7+ hours of sleep" means they tend to co-occur, not that more sleep directly caused the better mood. Sample sizes are always shown alongside every correlation.

Year in Pixels shows your entire year's mood data as a calendar grid where each day is colored based on your average mood. It provides a birds-eye view of emotional patterns across months — useful for spotting seasonal trends and longitudinal shifts.

A Premium feature that generates an eleven-section psychodynamic summary of your data. Sections include Presenting Picture, Affect Regulation, Defensive Functioning, Personality Organization, Mentalizing Capacity, Dream Content, Behavioral Correlates, Longitudinal Trajectory, and Clinical Impressions.

The report is generated on-device using deterministic, rule-based logic — no machine learning or AI interpretation is involved. It's designed to give you (and your clinician, if you share it) a structured view of patterns in your own data.

An evidence-based 0–100 score computed from your overnight HRV, heart rate, respiratory rate, wrist temperature, and sleep data using a sigmoid formula over 14-day rolling baselines. It helps identify how rested and recovered your body is day-to-day. Recovery trends beyond 7 days are a Premium feature.

All data is stored locally on your device using SwiftData with iOS Complete Protection file encryption. If you enable iCloud sync, data is also stored in your personal iCloud account using end-to-end encryption via Apple CloudKit. We do not operate any servers that receive or process your data.

Stress and recovery data is stored in a separate local-only SwiftData store that is never synced to CloudKit for additional privacy.

No. We have no technical ability to access your data. This is an architectural choice, not just a policy promise. There are no servers to breach because your data never leaves your device (except to your own iCloud account if you enable sync).

Go to Settings → Data Management → Delete All Data. This permanently removes everything from your device. You can also delete the app entirely, which removes all local data. If iCloud sync was enabled, data is removed from iCloud too.

Yes. Go to Settings → Data Management → Export Data. You can export as JSON (machine-readable) or PDF (human-readable report). Exports are generated entirely on your device.

No. There are no analytics SDKs, no tracking pixels, no Google Analytics, no Firebase, no Mixpanel, no Sentry, no Crashlytics, and no third-party data collection of any kind. The app's only external dependencies are Apple's own platform frameworks (HealthKit, CloudKit, StoreKit).

See our full Privacy Policy for details.

No. Every algorithm in the app is a deterministic, rule-based calculation. The app does not use machine learning, large language models, or any form of AI to interpret your data, score assessments, generate reports, or trigger safety flows. The Sentence Completion Exercise uses Apple's on-device NLTagger framework for sentiment analysis with a fixed keyword library — no learning model is involved.

The Essential (free) tier includes:

• Mood logging with all 165 emotions and the full circumplex
• Safety plan (Stanley & Brown model) and crisis resources
• All clinical assessments (PHQ-9, GAD-7, WHO-5, C-SSRS, ASQ, STIPO-R)
• Free-form journal and psychodynamic writing prompts (unlimited)
• DBT diary cards
• Dream journaling (up to 3 entries per month)
• Defense mechanism tracking (up to 5 entries per month)
• Apple Watch logging
• Home screen widgets
• Basic insights and correlations

No credit card is required to use the free tier.

Premium unlocks unlimited access to features including:

• Unlimited dream journaling and defense mechanism tracking
• Advanced insights dashboard and longitudinal correlations beyond 7 days
• Clinical Formulation Report (11-section psychodynamic summary)
• Recovery score trends beyond 7 days
• Psychodynamic profile history beyond 7 days
• Medication vital-effect analysis (pre/post dose correlation)
• Body sensation map
• Extended "Show Your Doc" exports

$4.99/month or $39.99/year (saving 33%). All new Premium subscribers get a 7-day free trial. You can cancel anytime.

Go to iPhone Settings → [Your Name] → Subscriptions → The Observing Ego → Cancel Subscription. You'll retain Premium access until the end of your current billing period. Refunds are handled by Apple per their standard refund policy.

No. Your data remains on your device. You'll lose access to Premium-only insights and features, but your logged data (moods, journal, assessments, medications) is yours and stays on your device.

When specific clinical thresholds are met, the app displays a full-screen safety check with crisis resources including the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline (call or text 988), the Crisis Text Line (text HOME to 741741), and 911 for emergencies. For child users, the screen also shows pre-configured parent/guardian contacts.

This screen cannot be accidentally dismissed by swiping — it must be acknowledged. You can also access crisis resources and your safety plan at any time from the main app, not just when a check is triggered.

Safety checks are intentionally narrow so they don't trigger on normal emotional experience. General negative emotions (angry, scared, sad) never trigger a safety check regardless of intensity. The specific triggers are:

• Selection of the emotion "Suicidal" at intensity ≥ 7 (teens ≥ 6)
• "Hopeless" at intensity ≥ 9
• "Worthless," "Trapped," "Empty," or "Despairing" at intensity ≥ 8
• PHQ-9 Question 9 (thoughts of self-harm) response of "Several days" or higher
• C-SSRS affirmative responses to Q2–Q6 (Q1 alone does not trigger)
• ASQ affirmative responses indicating suicidal ideation
• STIPO-R items 42 and 43 affirmative responses

These thresholds are based on published clinical guidelines.

The app records only a structured audit event with three fields: type, source, and outcome. It never stores your specific emotion labels, assessment responses, verbatim text, or the details of any crisis episode. This is an intentional privacy protection baked into the architecture, not just a policy.

Yes, always. Crisis resources, the 988 Lifeline, the Crisis Text Line, safety planning, C-SSRS screening, and ASQ screening are available to all users regardless of subscription status. Safety features cannot be disabled and cannot be paywalled. This is architectural, not policy.

Check that iCloud sync is enabled: iPhone Settings → [Your Name] → iCloud → The Observing Ego. Make sure you're signed into the same Apple ID on all devices and that you have an internet connection. CloudKit sync can take a few minutes to propagate changes.

Note that stress and recovery data is local-only by design and will not sync across devices.

Go to iPhone Settings → Privacy & Security → Health → The Observing Ego and make sure the data types you want are enabled. Note that HealthKit is not available on iPad (Apple platform limitation).

Also note that insights based on HealthKit data require at least 7 data points before they appear. If you just granted permissions, give the app a day or two of data before checking for insights.

The app lock uses your device's biometrics (Face ID or Touch ID). If biometrics fail, your device passcode is the fallback. If you've changed your biometrics, re-enable the lock in the app's Settings.

Widgets refresh periodically based on iOS's widget refresh budget. If a widget looks stale:

• Make sure the app has been opened recently (widgets update more frequently when the app is actively used)
• Long-press the widget and remove it, then re-add it from the widget gallery
• Restart the device if the issue persists

Email us at feedback@myobservingego.com with a description of the issue. Include your iOS version, device model, and what you were doing when the problem occurred. We aim to respond within 48 hours.