See if you can spot what’s wrong with this conversation…
A: How is your blood pressure?
B: Oh, it’s perfectly fine. It’s normal:). with a nice, honest smile on their face.
A: Are you on any blood pressure medication?
B. Oh, yes:)!
A: Why are you on blood pressure medication?
B: Because my blood pressure was high a few years ago but it’s normal now. We’ve got it under control.
It’s not one of those trick spot the mistake questions. The sad fact is that this happens so often. People delude themselves, with or without the help of the medical profession that their problem is ‘fixed’.
The glaring reality is that the only reason someone is on medication for high blood pressure is that there is something wrong with them and getting their blood pressure back to ‘normal’ through medication has not fixed the problem, it has just pushed the real problem further down the track and you are likely to get kicked in the bum a lot harder in the future because you didn’t handle it back in the past. You may have thought you had. You may have had several changes in medications or dosages to continue to keep your blood pressure in ‘normal’ levels but that DOES NOT MEAN THAT YOUR BLOOD PRESSURE IS NORMAL.
The fact is that it is so ABNORMAL that you need medication to keep it under control. It bears repeating: being in a state where you need medication is definitely not normal. It’s important to realise that and to appreciate that it’s not just about blood pressure. It’s about seeing that high blood pressure is a primary warning sign that you have heart disease. And that is definitely something that needs attending to.
This is not the standard view but then the standard view is coming seriously under the microscope. Here’s an article from my favourite Scottish GP that can help you to bring this point home to yourself: https://drmalcolmkendrick.org/2018/11/01/what-causes-heart-disease-part-58-blood-pressure/
So what to do?
- Get armed with enough information so you can start making some different lifestyle choices.
- Stay on your medication until the new choices you make lead to you needing a reduction in your blood pressure medication. This you should be doing with your prescribing doctor. At some point you may even get off them altogether.
- Learn to fine tune what you are doing over time. Be consistent and persistent.
Here’s information that I trust and recommend that will help you with point 1: https://www.dietdoctor.com/blood-pressure
You’ll find my free summary of what lifestyle choices to make on this page: https://www.daragrennie.com/health/evolving-food-pyramids/. This will help you take all the guess work out of how to shift to a lower carbohydrate intake. Plus it will save you hours and hours and hours of reading.
One specific mechanism that I think is important to understand, that most people seem to get quite easily, is that one of the actions insulin has is that it makes the kidneys retain salt. What happens when you retain salt? You need to retain more water to keep the salt levels at normal amounts for cell function. What happens when you increase the amount of fluid in a closed system? You increase the pressure. i.e. your blood pressure. And what increases insulin the most? Carbohydrates. Which is one of the reasons that restricting carbohydrates is a key strategy that helps people reduce or get off their blood pressure medication along with a whole host of other benefits.
Some people who have hypertension have salt sensitive hypertension. So you need to work with your diet and doctor if you think that could be you.
Related Pages & Posts
Two doctors who handled their own blood pressure issues:
For Dr Robert Su, his high blood pressure was his wake up call…
http://daragrennie.com/carbohydrates-can-kill-dr-robert-su-md/
For Dr Steve Phinney I believe it was a later development that needed more fine tuning.
http://daragrennie.com/the-art-and-science-of-low-carbohydrate-living/
You’ll see hypertension is just one of many issues that can be addressed with these lifestyle changes, on this page:
https://www.daragrennie.com/health/evolving-food-pyramids/