Thanks.

It's great to hear your story renee. I am so glad you are doing so much better. Since I joined this group, my salt intake has gone down dramatically and along with it...my BP. Glad to be your friend on this site. If you need support just let me know.

Try the DASH meal plan. A lot of people, including members on this site, have used it successfully. Doctors love it, and it has been around a long time. Great for cardiac patients.

HI THere,

Am new to MFP......I am praying it will make a difference in not only how I look but how I feel. I have six children (one of whom which is only seven months old). All my pregnancies were uncomplicated except for baby six when I started having high blood pressure around 14 weeks. It started to climb slowly. Long story short............I went into the hospital and my bp spiked to the point I needed a magensium drip. Well, went home and thought my bp would most likely go back to normal after delivery only to find out later, after nearly passing out, that my bp was up to 180/95. I have been on six different medications and finally seems amlodopine works best for me. Well feel good but feel as though I want to get off this medication entirely. I don't want to be medication dependent especially for the rest of my life. I am definitely 50 pounds over what I should be. My desire with MFP is to lose weight and start seeing a gradual lowering of my bp whereas I can decrease the dosage over time. A doctor told me once that despite my losing weight and eating right my bp may remain high but I feel as though I need to try anyway. THANIKS

I have. I make all fresh food basically. All my own sauces dressings and dips.
I always take lunch to work and make sure I have had breakfast.
I've lost about 30 lbs. (about 10lbs. short of target) and have kept my sodium below 1500 mg./day for the last 90 days at least.
My original BP was 180/115.
For the last 2 months it's been at or below 120/80.

My plan is to drastically cut sodium and caffeine. I already eat about 3 bananas per day so I'm sure I'm getting enough potassium. I also stopped my birth control pills in case they are contributing to the high blood pressure. I going to give yoga a try to see if that helps me relax.

Hi Cheryl! increasing my potassium has made a huge impact on lowering my bp. I would suggest eating twice as much potassium as sodium. The actual numbers don't seem to matter as much as the ratio. And bananas are overrated... potatoes on the other hand.

Once you start the meds, the doctors won't let you off even if you bp goes down

At my last dr visit my bp was 118/77. The dr says in my follow up visit if the weight loss continues we can explore reducing some on the meds.

Good for you Greg...!

Well my story is kind of a mixed bag. I'm 6'2, and my highest weight was 354 lbs, and got down to 330 lbs before I started having heart palpitations at night that would wake me up out of sleep and cause my pulse to go up to 140. They thought it was an arrythmia. When they were taking my BP measurements at the cardiologists office, they were up to 166/119, or something ridiculous like that. I was eventually diagnosed with mild sleep apnea, and given a prescription for Bisoprolol. It also turns out I have a heart defect that contributes to the high blood pressure.

So I had enough by this point. I'm 27, and I have to take a BP medication and a CPAP machine. This is crazy. So I made a point to change my life. I started cooking more and going to the gym. Just getting off my butt and trying to be active. Well after 10 months, I'm proud to say I've lost 52 lbs. I feel a lot better than I used to, but not quite where I need to be though. I think the important thing is to change your habits to something sustainable for the long term

Hi all, thanks for sharing your personal hypertension histories, struggles, tips, etc. I am a 56 y.o. man presently living a mostly sedentary life. I am 5'10" and weighed in this morning at 208. Five years ago, I was pretty fit at around 170#, working out regularly and on an Isagenix maintenance regime. But then we had another kid and I blew off the exercise routine plus arthritis set in -- I am now contemplating double hip replacement, and even walking as an exercise is difficult. So I was not surprised to learn six months ago from my GP that my BP was too high and it has only risen since then. It has been higher since them but this morning the reading was 161/93.

i am *not* a pharma fan, so I want to try to bring it down through diet and natural methods and give them a chance before I consider going onto meds. I am open to ideas and want to learn from others' successes (and failures too). I am presently focusing on these things:
- reducing sodium intake to the 1500 level
- reducing caloric intake to the sub-1500 level
- consuming herbs and other natural supplements that are known to be helpful in the treatment of hypertension.

Today, I have re-started an Isagenix regime since it is consistent with these things and to track everything here on MFP. Please feel free to "friend" me.

Thanks,

Jim

Hello! My name is Tiffany and I actually joined this group more for my husband than myself. December 5th 2012 we had a scare, my husband's blood pressure was SCARY high; I thought he was just having a panic attack (which *I* get frequently) and had him lay down and relax. Come to find out it wasn't -just- the panic attack it was also his BP.

So long story short, my husband has high BP and is on pills for it, he also got tested for diabetes which results should come soon (highly likely he has it). I was hoping that this group would really help out with recipes and the like; it's really hard to find low sugar AND sodium.

On another note, he weighed in the high 300's at the time but has been consistantly working out and is currently around mid-high 300s.