Saturday, July 26, 2008

My blood pressure has improved!

I have a home BP monitor; years ago a doctor put me on beta blockers for my blood pressure but I stopped taking them 8 years ago. I still have the digital BP monitor she encouraged me to buy. It has an 8-reading memory.

Unless I take my BP as soon as I wake up, my diastolic is high but my systolic is high-normal/high. The last 8 readings on there have systolics in the 140-160 range and diastolics in the 100-110 range, with pulse readings between 90-100 bpm. Personally I think it's cheating to take my BP when I haven't even gotten out of bed yet so I try to take it several hours after waking up but not right after activity to get a good idea of what it really is.

So, I took it after relaxing for about 20 minutes while reading a book. My BP was 138/101, pulse 85. That is still too high, but it is an improvement over what it was a month ago. That's progress! I like progress!

My goal is to have systolics in the 120s and diastolics in the 70s, with a resting heart rate in the 60-70bpm range. (70-80 is considered healthy for an adult woman).

I'm on my way!

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