Who Has Dropped Their Blood Pressure? Tell Your Story!

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  • mwyvr
    mwyvr Posts: 1,883 Member
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    @rubyjune27 Good to hear that you were able to bring your BP under control, so here's to your new program.

    @Pootler74 It's interesting how your BP changed when, in your own words, you got serious. That's a NSV to help you going forward.

    @peterjsmithers Thanks for sharing your experience and very happy for you that you've brought your BP under control. I'd never heard of water fasting as a treatment for BP before. It's good to know there are alternatives for those where weight loss and exercise are unable to do the job.
  • BigLifter10
    BigLifter10 Posts: 1,151 Member
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    After a car accident where I was hit from behind at 60 mph, I was not up for moving around a lot and cut a lot of my activity. I wasn't overweight when it happened, but over the course of the next decade, I gained 42 pounds and was basically sedentary - work, home, couch. I didn't go to the doctor because I didn't want to know how bad any of it was (didn't go for 7 years). When I went in my BP was 150/90, so they had me re-take and monitor it for a week. Same. I did South Beach and lost 15 lbs within a month. BP dropped to 130/85 or so. I maintained it for a while, then started walking again. I didn't watch what I ate as closely and went up a few pounds...BP went with it, even though I was walking more. Finally, fast forward a couple of years and I decided to get real about it all. I started boxing, watching what I ate (chose healthy, nutrient-dense foods). Currently BP hovers around 124/82 with pulse of 74. Doc is happy, I am happy and I can see the correlation with what I do to how my body responds. So glad I made the decision to take charge of my health again!!!
  • morschjodo
    morschjodo Posts: 22 Member
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    I was pre-hypertensive after graduating college and the doctor told me to lose weight and exercise. I got engaged and had the motivation to lose weight for my wedding. I lost 45 lbs or so and didn't have any troubles with BP even though I went up and down in weight a couple times over the next few years. Then I got pregnant and BP was great at the beginning of pregnancy. I even had a 118/60 reading. I developed pre-eclampsia around 26 weeks and the day my son was born my BP was out of control and I had a 199/86 and 146/103 readings, it was crazy. We got things to settle down back to normal within a couple of months but I gained a lot of stress weight with a NICU baby and did not take care of myself. I was up in the 140s/90s and was put on medication. February of this year I decided to start taking care of myself, eating better and started getting back to the gym in March. I've been able to get off of one medication (amlodapine) and am just taking a "water pill" now. But my BPs have been normal or even low after only a few weeks. One thing I think is significant in my diet is much less sodium has helped immensly with water retention. I can tell the next day when I have a salty treat or haven't drank enough water. I am hoping with losing a bunch more weight I can get off the water pill also.
  • mwyvr
    mwyvr Posts: 1,883 Member
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    Bump, these are great stories!
  • Happylybre
    Happylybre Posts: 85 Member
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    I don't know the exact readings but, My doctor told me that my blood pressure was the same as a Skinny skinny tiny person (am not a skinny person) and to add more HEALTHY FATS to my diet :p ....Coming from a Diabetic FAMILY ... That's GREAT NEWS.... So happy I can eat the WHOLE avocado now.... :)<3
  • meganjcallaghan
    meganjcallaghan Posts: 949 Member
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    Had normal BP as a fat person, dropped buttloads of weight and it went up to hypertensive even though I was doing "all the right things". All the doctors I had to see throughout the process of donating a kidney told me to just "keep doing what I'm doing", but what I was doing was dropping my sodium lower and lower (because lower is supposed to be better, right?) and doing more and more exercise (because all the literature and doctors say that's supposed to lower bp, right?) and adding more and more potassium to my diet (because they say maybe if you have high blood pressure and are already low sodium and doing enough exercise it might be that your potassium is not high enough...right?) And it turned out that I wasn't getting ENOUGH sodium to balance out my loss from exercise and my excess potassium intake. Nobody was able to figure that out for me. Luckily I figured it out for myself by trial and error before it became a huge health problem or caused the donor team to decide I was not a suitable candidate. Now I add salt to everything under the sun and keep my BP around 106/64. If I have a few low sodium days I notice it creeping back up to the 130/84 range.
  • mwyvr
    mwyvr Posts: 1,883 Member
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    Hey that's an interesting story @meganjcallaghan thanks for sharing it. I'm aware of too-low sodium causing problems in runners and other athletes (and we are all athletes here right?) so it's interesting reading your case.
  • andympanda
    andympanda Posts: 763 Member
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    meganjcallaghan wrote: »
    Had normal BP as a fat person, dropped buttloads of weight and it went up to hypertensive even though I was doing "all the right things". All the doctors I had to see throughout the process of donating a kidney told me to just "keep doing what I'm doing", but what I was doing was dropping my sodium lower and lower (because lower is supposed to be better, right?) and doing more and more exercise (because all the literature and doctors say that's supposed to lower bp, right?) and adding more and more potassium to my diet (because they say maybe if you have high blood pressure and are already low sodium and doing enough exercise it might be that your potassium is not high enough...right?) And it turned out that I wasn't getting ENOUGH sodium to balance out my loss from exercise and my excess potassium intake. Nobody was able to figure that out for me. Luckily I figured it out for myself by trial and error before it became a huge health problem or caused the donor team to decide I was not a suitable candidate. Now I add salt to everything under the sun and keep my BP around 106/64. If I have a few low sodium days I notice it creeping back up to the 130/84 range.

    Since I have been on BP medication, whenever i have any sort of blood test, my doctor automatically adds potasium and sodium to the tests.

  • valeriesmith1840
    valeriesmith1840 Posts: 41 Member
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    Yes! My blood pressure rising was a huge part of why I stayed motivated to lose in the first place. I remember using one of those pharmacy blood pressure things things and I have always had good numbers...but a couple of winters ago I discovered my blood pressure rising consistently into pre-hypertension. My Husband has high blood pressure and this really scared me. I have lost 30 pounds and have more to go, but my blood pressure has dropped down to normal/healthy numbers and I also have had far higher iron levels, as I was bordering on anemia.
  • meganjcallaghan
    meganjcallaghan Posts: 949 Member
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    mwyvr wrote: »
    Hey that's an interesting story @meganjcallaghan thanks for sharing it. I'm aware of too-low sodium causing problems in runners and other athletes (and we are all athletes here right?) so it's interesting reading your case.

    Yeah, I had no idea running as much as I do could be what was causing the issue. The doctors all knew how much I was running and never said anything, so it took all kinds of hunting to find what the minimum required amount of sodium is per day (500mg....but I had a heck of a time finding that. Everyone always wants to tell you the max, but never the minimum) and one day deciding to figure out my sweat rate just for kicks. Turns out I was losing around 6 pounds in a 2 hour run. Apparently that's about 3 liters of sweat/exhalation etc....which would (on the low end) equal about 7500 mg of sodium lost. I run 2 to 3 hours every day. So it's no surprise that after months of taking in only 500 mg, losing 7500 and ending up in a 7000 mg deficit of sodium every single day, I had right messed myself up.

  • Tedebearduff
    Tedebearduff Posts: 1,155 Member
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    mwyvr wrote: »
    Were you hypertensive (or headed there) and brought it under control with weight loss and/or improving your diet, health & fitness? Inspire others, tell your BP story!

    I doubt this would inspire others, lets be real your doctor should be telling you what you need to do... he lays it out for you. Lose weight, eat better, go to the gym, be more active, etc etc.... it's just actually doing it.... All you have to do is do it!

    My doctor told me I had to go on ramipril, also told me I needed to lose weight and get healthy so I did.... I use to be diabetic also .... or "pre diabetic" ,was on metformin & also took Crestor for cholesterol. Anyways I did the obvious and lost weight (172lbs lost) and got healthy now I have 0 medications and am doing just fine. It's really simple there is no magic to this whole thing just start doing it.
  • mwyvr
    mwyvr Posts: 1,883 Member
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    Being told by a doctor what to do is one thing but however much trust someone might have in their doc, reading people's success stories can help inspire people to, as you say, "just start doing it".

  • jgnatca
    jgnatca Posts: 14,464 Member
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    I started to see some major changes after my first thirty pounds gone. I started to have faintness and dizzy spells. Some of it was low blood sugar, and some of it was low blood pressure. I was on meds for both at the time. I kept records of my sugar and my BP and eventually negotiated stopping the meds. I have kept testing my BP weekly and it has stayed in the low-normal range.

    When I started running I saw a big change in my resting heart rate (for the better).
  • jgnatca
    jgnatca Posts: 14,464 Member
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    I tried doing this yesterday, but I couldn't pull the data together. Here's one year's worth of data. I stopped taking blood pressure meds about August last year.

    https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1T2BVpnJFyaG1I7ZdL2dS9FyHVLRLnmFLxqmOv2VcqYg/pubchart?oid=1931077934&format=image
  • mwyvr
    mwyvr Posts: 1,883 Member
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    Wasn't able to open that link due to permissions but congratulations on your achievement!
  • happygalah
    happygalah Posts: 343 Member
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    I was bordeline for awhile. Not enough for meds. Doctor though it was white coat. So I went in having chest pains and my bp was something like 150/110. I had to get a 24hr monitor and my average came back at 137/75 so the doctor decided to put me on meds.

    Everytime I would go in it would be high and then I take it at home it would be fine.

    Last week, I went in for my checkup and it was the lowest in the doctor's office in years at 127/88. She was very pleased.

    I'm hoping to get off the meds at some point but we just want to make sure it stays down first.
  • camground2
    camground2 Posts: 41 Member
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    jenniejoy07 wrote: »
    My BP reads ~140/85; my doctor is giving me year to get myself under control with diet/exercise because she knows I can do it. Interested to see how my BP reacts to my new lifestyle I've been living for 5 weeks now!

    My husband went from that exact reading to 110/85. In 6 weeks. He started lifting, running and not eating any fast food. And yes. He lost tons of weight. He went from a sendentary vacation to let's hike 26 miles in 4 days over 4 mountain passes. You can do it!
  • mwyvr
    mwyvr Posts: 1,883 Member
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    @Camground2 Love your story! So many more life benefits come out of getting healthier and fitter than just bringing our BP down. Getting back to long lost fun activities or discovering new ones is a huge reward too!
  • camground2
    camground2 Posts: 41 Member
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    Yes! I agree. We want to still have fun as we grow older (50 now). Don't want to retire and be too sick to have fun!
  • ImportedRose
    ImportedRose Posts: 9 Member
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    There is a natural flower called "Jamaica". When you eat at a Mexican taco place, you more likely will see this drink as an option. Anyway, most Mexican markets sell this as a dry flower. Try tis - place a hand full in a large container filled with drinking water and add chia seeds, refrigerate and drink glass in AM and one in PM. You should see your blood pressure go down. This natural mix also cleans your kidneys from toxins etc. see for yourself. My coworker's uncontrolled and high blood pressure was normal when she went for her follow up appt. with doctor. But remember common sense. Take your meds and add this to your routine, then see if your meds, per your doctor, need to be discontinued.

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