Uff-Da!

Hi Michael,

Yes, I'm still away from medication. I don't know how long that will last, though. I'm keeping pretty close tabs on my BP, as I know I'll have to discuss it with my doctor at my next physical, which I'll schedule sometime after I'm eligible for Medicare in about a month. (That's age 65.)

I've discovered that I have postprandial hypotension, which means that my SBP drops more than 20 points after a meal. By eating all day long, my body is almost always in a postprandial state, so I can keep my daytime pressure down most of the time. (Good thing I'm thin!) Sometimes it even drops lower than I like. For example, about a month ago I got readings of 100/56 and 93/65 after one meal. I just want to go to bed and sleep when that happens, but it usually only drops to somewhere between 110/60 to 125/75 at the lowest.

Of course, there are times it isn't convenient to eat every two hours, I forget, or I apparently don't eat the right things to keep my pressure down. There are occasional days when my systolic tends to run mostly in the 150s, with spikes higher and dips lower. But the majority of the time if I haven't eaten in many hours, my SPB is around 130 if I have rested quietly at least five minutes. But even the lightest activity, like getting up for a glass of water and sitting back down, sends my systolic to 140-145. So at this point, I don't know if I'm going to be able to stay away from the meds or not. If I could just behave myself and stay away from coffee and any commercially frozen products and eat my big homemade salads at least twice every day, I expect I could keep the pressure down. But when I get lazy and want quick meals and am stressed, that's when my pressure gets higher than it should. I'd say that overall, I'm right at the borderline of medicate or don't medicate right now.