Anyone reduced high blood pressure without medication?

[higgle]

I've been teetering on the edge of quite high blood pressure for years.
10 years ago reducing weight to a level that made me look pretty unhealthy and exercising like mad got me down to 135/80 but now I'm back to about a stone over top of healthy weight, its just after Christmas, so I've been eating and drinking too much ( and probably all that salty cheese hasn't done me much good)

I'm not an easy patient for my GP, hate being touched, messed with and being subject to the ailments of middle age. It totally pisses me off that DH who exercises constantly can eat what he likes and still weigh 10 stone 4, he has normal blood pressure and hardly measurable cholesterol.

So, has anyone got a regime I should follow for 3 months ( the longest GP will let me go without seeing me again) To save myself from decline into the medication regime of an old woman?

My uncle used one of these www.resperate.co.uk/ he is sensitive to medication and could not find a b.p med that did not make him feel bad. This thing did work, combined with healthy diet, he also lost some weight.

Someone told me that beet root juice brings down high blood pressure.

Here's what I did -

Cut out alcohol and caffeine
Tried to cut out as much salt and sugar as possible
Upped water intake
High strength garlic capsule each day
Two tablespoons apple cider vinegar each day
Calcium and magnesium supplements
More exercise (even just some extra walking)

All these brought my BP down from around 140/90 to around 115/75 within about 2 weeks.

I have however lapsed over Xmas and my BP is right back up again, so I do think that the changes need to be permanent, I'm afraid, if you want to keep your BP down.....

Good luck!

I'm a total coffee addict so I think that will be the hardest bit. Not drinking until Easter now anyway ( we always do that) I'm pleased to see the changes seem to work quite quickly. I could start walking more straight away and I'm going to start running again as soon as it is light enough to see, and dry enough not to fall over in a sea of mud.

Off to order a BP monitor on Amazon

Oh, and I forgot - I tried to eat more oats/bananas/eggs/beetroot! - I did some research and these all are supposed to help.

Of course, I would love to know which of all the things I threw at it made any difference!

I have a home monitor and I also found that once the figures started to come down, I relaxed a bit about the whole issue and I think that helped too!

My father has had great success lowering (and maintaining) his BP by going on the DASH diet when he was in his 40s (along with exercising daily). Good luck!

The energy art of Qigong has been proven to reduce bloodpressure and is very easy to learn and do.

Here's just one link I found

www.qigonginstitute.org/html/papers/Anti-Aging_Benefits_of_Qigong.html

Qigong has very many benefits, not just the reduction in blood pressure

Good luck

Low carbing will sort you out.

Lloyds Pharmacy have brought out their own version of the Respirate machine for £34.99. I've just bought one but not got round to trying it yet so can't say how effective it will be.
www.lloydspharmacy.com/en/lloydspharmacy-advanced-blood-pressure-lowering-system-35500

Thanks for all the useful information. I think that having my GP appointment earl in the morning made me more stressed rather than less stressed. I'm back on my diet ( low carb doesn't suit me, and being veggie makes it harder) will give up all the wicked food and the dog will be getting a bit more exercise too. I've persuaded my GP to leave me alone for 3 months to see if I can sort myself out and I'll report back how I'm getting on.

Just remembered one more thing - co-enzyme Q10 supplements are also supposed to help lower blood pressure, as well as some medications, although they are quite expensive!