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this post was submitted on 24 Aug 2023
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British Problems
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Sorry it's a day late, it's been a bit of a rough week for me.
My Blood Pressure was up to 182/107, and I ended up in hospital having a round of tests to check I wasn't at risk of anything serious damage.
I've got it down since then, and am now in the normal range, albeit the high end, but I've given up caffeine, nicotine, salt and a few other vices.
And then I've spent to last day in bed with a really painful stomach ache.
It's awesome that you're quitting several vices, you're going to have a hard time cold turkeying caffeine, nicotine and salt all at once. Have you considered a taper instead of straight quitting three different substances which will all have a drastic effect alone, let alone combined? Also bear in mind you need a little salt in a healthy diet! So I hope you meant quitting excessive salt.
To be honest, it was probably an overreaction to what was going on, but yeah, basically cold turkey. I stopped putting salt on stuff, but will go back now but less than I used to. I do tend to put a lot of salt on stuff, so that's probably something I should sort anyway. I think I got a bit liberal after flirting with keto.
I'd already been tapering off of nicotine, and was vaping something in the range of 1-3mg, whereas those disposables are supposed to be 20mg for reference. I probably will vape again when drinking, but dropping the daily habit is a step towards quitting.
Caffeine's been the hardest. I've had caffeine headaches for days. I don't remember going a day without it, and would drink somewhere in the range of 2 - 4 coffees/cokes a day, sometimes a 2ltr bottle to myself. I've realised I relied on it to feel motivated and I'm kind of a different person without it. It's weird. Cutting it out has reduced my anxiety and over thinking though, so I think I'm going to keep cutting it out.
I did a few weeks off coffee couple of months ago, it is indeed one of the worst ones. Nicotine for me was purely mental with very few physical symptoms, caffeine was horrendous. Then a helpful soul on here informed me I hadn't really detoxed off it, as it apparently it takes about a month to fully work out of our system!
Good luck with your new habits. And remember if you do have a day where you 'fail' with one of them it's not a failure, stopping for a week is a giant improvement on everyday.
A whole, wait, what now!?
I was similarly shocked and horrified haha.
Ugh high BP is the worst. I'm on two different BP meds, one of which has given me hideous cankles. I console myself that it's better than having a stroke, but it sucks that I felt better before.
Ah sorry to hear that. I haven't heard great things about the meds.
It's been really hard to accept the idea of potentially going on meds, but as you say, if they're going to potentially save our lives, it's got to be done.
What the doctor said that convinced me to take it seriously: you can recover really well from a heart attack and carry on with your life. If a stroke doesn't kill you, the resulting brain damage will leave you with life-altering conditions, such paralysis of half your body, loss of speech (aphasia), trouble swallowing, memory issues, double vision... it's quite a list. Losing my independence would be unbearable, so I take my meds and keep my cankles covered. :-)
Yeah, that's a really good point. A morbid one, but a good one.
Nasty business - mine got high enough that I was threatened with hospital but it's on its way down now and Inam hoping my next annual (always a typo danger) check gives much better numbers, although the last lot weren't bad I was expecting worse after the lack of checks during lockdown and the shitty old time I had of it in the last few years. Comparing numbers with my cousins at my aunt's funeral and I reckon I'll outlive the lot of them.
Well done for getting it down. It's tough to do, as all the fun stuff makes it go up.
It's funny, when the subject comes up, you do end up comparing numbers. Everyone I've talked to about this has been telling me theirs haha.
It's not been too bad (helped by my giving up booze a long time ago), I was just able to start cooking for myself. I had cut down sugar, red meat and UPF but I've been able to do that more without it being a hardship. I am not down to the weight or probably the fitness leveI was 5ish years ago (before a bought of illness) but, factoring in a bit of Christmas weight gain, I have lost 12kgs since this time last year, which has really helped and I noticed I have not only gone down a size in clothing but now need slim fit (so I may have more muscle mass this time around). However, we'll see what my numbers look like in a few months.
I think at "a certain age" they start giving routine blood tests and these days you get a handy print-out for further study.
If you're concerned about your blood pressure it's worth getting a blood pressure monitor (choose a type that's listed by the British Heart Foundation or the NHS). Just being in a doctor's surgery or hospital can cause "white coat hypertension" and it doesn't take tensing up much to add ten or twenty mmHg to your blood pressure (1mmHg isn't much pressure).
If you can test at home and take an average over a decent amount of time, then it will give you a much better picture of what your BP actually is, and whether there is a problem, and if there is a problem, if what you're doing is helping to fix the problem.
I've had one for a while, and have been measuring 3 times first and last thing in the day for the last 5 days. The GP's going to decide my fate based on that. It's been mostly sitting the cupboard collecting dust until now haha.