Blood pressure

[Mooosewoman]

My BP this morning was 150/89, which isn’t scarily high but I need to reduce it. I’ve tried six different BP medications but they all give me an upset stomach.

I want to try and reduce my BP naturally.

Please can you give me your tips that work. Thank you.

Yes, because the swelling (and other symptoms) go within 2 days of stopping. I've never had swollen feet/ankles until trying various bp meds.

I am interested in these beetroot tablets though. Can anyone link to them please?

EDIT - @LoafofSellotape Lercanipidine is the 7th one I'm taking and I have swollen wrists and fingers as well as feet/ankles 😬

I thought the NICE guidelines say to average the two readings, but my GP always takes the lowest one from each session, which worries me as it seems artificially low.

Oh no,that's such a shame, I had no issues with it at all ,but Losartan on a high dose was absolutely hideous.

It's not artificially low, the first one is artificially high because you are nervous, rushing, white coat syndrome.

it's not the sessions at the surgery, but my home sessions - I recorded 3x morning and night. They are almost always high, but if I can manage to get one low one in a session, they use that - but I worry that 90% of the day it's high, because so many of the readings are that high. (i know that they're high because I also measure it more times than just the 'official' ones, and mostly they are all high. I don't think I'm particularly nervous about the fact it's high, I'm quite used to it by now, but it doesn't change)

I’m uploading mine on an app to the GP at the moment, it says keep measuring till it levels out and report the lowest (I usually do about 6 readings over about 20 mins without moving in between). I guess taking the lowest is the best way to get consistency.

I also take a combination of rampril and amlodipine, it controls my BP and no swelling. Initially I did get swelling with a higher dose of amlodipine but now it's 5mg it's fine.
I've had every test going, no reason why my BP is what it is. I'm around 10kg overweight which in highsight isn't too much , considering I know someone who is a size 22 and has normal BP.
I remember when I found out about my high BP, a random check by the GP, she thought the machine was broken when it came out at 187/97, eventually rising to 210/110 (I have severe anxiety once the cuff comes on my arm). GP was baffled, sent me straight to the hospital, couldn't believe I was my normal self. I also couldn't believe I was living life, exercising, heavy lifting and was none the wiser. It really is the silent killer. If you never check your BP, you'd never know and that's terrifying.
I'd love to be cured and not be on medication for the rest of my life (I've been on it since I was 27!)

@Marble10 it is a silent killer and a major cause of kidney failure.

I know what you mean about all of the home readings high during the day unless you sit down and clear your mind of thoughts, which sounds pretty artificial to me as when is my mind ever free and I am sitting still.

However, the readings should be lower when you sleep, which will bring down your average for the day.

If you are concerned, your GP can prescribe you an ambulatory blood pressure monitor. A pharmacy can set you up. You wear the cuff for 24 hours and it takes readings over the course of the day. Your GP will be able to review the results alongside blood tests for cholesterol etc to give you a clearer idea of your risk.

Here is what worked for me -

1. I bought an Omron blood pressure monitor and downloaded the app. I take BP morning (twice) and night (twice). It automatically goes to the app and they take the average of the two readings. I sit quietly for a few mins before taking any readings. The app is very good, it provides colour coding depending on the reading, so it was a good incentive to look at the day then month and try and have no brown, then move towards more and more pink and blue colour readings.

2. Lost a significant amount of weight. I would see the BP averages start to trend down very slowly as I continued to lose weight.

3. Exercise. Again, as exercised was introduced I saw the BP trend down again, and I notice if I have missed a few days.

4. Actively worked on reducing stress. Hard to measure, but I get higher readings on days I know I have more stress at work, so I can see it.

5. Being diagnosed with and treating sleep aponea with a CPAP machine was the biggest immediate change, and dropped the numbers dramatically.

Everything that you do will help so ; more activity, less salt, less alcohol, lose weight, good diet etc.Chip away at what you can do . Monitor your blood pressure twice daily for a week (2 or 3 times morning at evening at rest and writing the 'best ' each occasion) , the doctor will want the average.
If your BP remains poorly controlled take the least worst option medication wise.

That’s what I’ve been doing for the last couple of months, upped my activity, less salt (switched to unsalted butter, low-salt marmite, cut right back on crisps etc), mine is a bit lower than it was in November now, gone from average over 4 days 134/87 to 127/86, which I’m really pleased about as I went completely off the rails food and exercise-wise over Christmas. I haven’t lost any weight to speak of yet but I am working on that too, using Slimpod as I want to get it properly back into the normal range.

Those readings are fine, well done.

Please can you give me your tips that work. Thank you

HTH

Lose weight if overweight. Try to get weight down to BMI of 22 or 23
No alcohol
Exercise daily so that you're puffing, not a gentle walk
Olive leaf extract - I use Viridian
Hawthorn Berry - I use Cytoplan

Thank you, my GP wasn't happy with them in November and said I was borderline for medication and I do want to avoid that. I realise some on here have further to go with getting it down but every little change is a step towards better health and worth doing. Good luck everyone.

Be careful if you switch to herbal tea. I did until I realised that the herbal tea I liked best had lots of liquorice in it. Apparently that can put your blood pressure up 🙁
Nikki's story - BP Uk
I just have a little bit of regular tea and coffee now and then water.

Licorice definitely causes high BP. Kt happened to me !

I think the GP might prefer the diastolic below 85

But it shouldn't be too difficult to achieve that without medication

Sometimes it isn't anything you've done. My friend has this post pregnancy despite being slim & healthy.

Potassium doesn't lower bp and isn't something you should play around with supplementing. Technically magnesium does but rarely to a noticeable level with oral supplements (we give it iv in about 10-15x the oral dose if want to use it for bp but often doesn't work) but isn't going to do harm

Cutting salt out your diet, exerrcise and weight loss is prob the predominant methods of non drug methods

Dog walks albeit still better than a sedentary life style don't really count for exercise when we as drs say exercise. You need to be vigorous enough to be pushing your anaerobic threshold (when you swap over to not using oxygen to drive the exercise). The best way of understanding this is that you're walking brisk enough so that you can talk but not sing. But ideally proper cardiovascular and strength training exercise is far preferable

There are three things that I think helped me cure my high blood pressure:

1. drinking a pint of water when I wake up, and continuing to drink either cold and hot water throughout the day.
2. not adding salt to good, and eating all home cooked food, only rarely eating other food.
3. Cutting out sugar. When I eat lots of chocolates, my blood pressure goes up. I’ve read that sugar intake is more significant to high blood pressure than salt.

Yes, I’m aiming for 120/80

I’ve read that about the liquorice before but had forgotten about it, but I don’t like it. I must remind DH though as he is partial to it.