If you think the medicine cabinet is the only place to find the remedy for high blood pressure, think again. Some lifestyle tweaks can be done in order to get your body back in tip-top shape.
Enjoy a nice walk
Training strengthens the heart muscle, so it is more effective to pump blood. And that can help you to relax your arteries. Your blood pressure is lowered with the heart beating with less power.
No wonder the American Heart Association (AHA) suggests a heart-pumping aerobic activity for at least 150 minutes a week. And you don't exert a lot of effort to reap the benefits. Research published in 2019 in the journal Hypertension found that a 30-minute morning walk can be as effective as a prescription for the rest of the day to reduce blood pressure. If you are now sedentary, try 10-15 minutes of walking and gradually work your way up to 30 minutes.
Be faithful to your medication
If you have started taking blood pressure-lowering medicine but are still not seeing decreased numbers, you must miss a dose here and there. 62% of those with chronic illness don't take drugs because they have forgotten in a survey published in the BMC Health Services Research.
Try one of these tricks to get into the habit of taking your medications as prescribed: put a schedule on your mobile phone or watch to go off at the same time every day; synchronize your med-taking with an activity you do at the same time every day (for example, coffee in the morning or brushing your teeth); or place a schedule note somewhere you can't forget it, like a mirror in the bathroom or a refrigerator.
Eat a healthy diet
It's the single most significant shift in lifestyle that you can make if you want to lower your blood pressure. Seek to eat a diet rich in fruits and vegetables, whole grains, low-fat dairy products, skinless poultry and fish, nuts and legumes, and vegetable oils that are not tropical.
A simple way for any group on the list to be satisfied? The DASH diet (Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension) has high-quality evidence supporting the importance of a diet rich in fruits, vegetables, and low-fat dairy foods in reducing blood pressure. The blood pressure gain will start within two weeks.
Meditate
Developing a daily practice of meditation can greatly decrease blood pressure and stress, a study published in Journal of Human Hypertension in 2019 suggests. For people with high blood pressure, it is especially important to manage stressful aspects of life. It's not about getting rid of stress entirely, but about having the skills to minimize its impact.
