Dealing with a "Silent Killer"

High blood pressure or Hypertension is known as the "silent killer" and is one of the most common diseases of the cardiovascular system. It is defined as a condition of sustained elevated pressure in the arteries of 140/90 or higher. In this case, 140 is the systolic pressure. Simply put, systolic pressure represents the blood pressure against the arteries while the heart is contracting or beating. The number 90 is the diastolic pressure, meaning the blood pressure while the heart is relaxing or between beats.


High blood pressure is both a sign, as well as a causal factor. As hypertension in the body becomes prolonged, the risk for heart failure, vascular disease, kidney (renal) failure, and stroke increases, which makes it the leading associated cause of death and disability. Although there has been no cause identified for hypertension in 90 percent of people, dietary factors have been shown to influence blood pressure. People with hypertension can use the following food guidelines:

Avoid foods high in sodium: Sodium causes vasoconstriction, the narrowing of blood vessels. Therefore, the amount of space blood has to travel through decreases. This decrease creates an increase in the resistance the blood has to overcome. This increased resistance makes it more difficult for the arteries to expand with each beat of the heart, causing the internal pressure to rise. High sodium foods include processed meats, salted snack foods, cheeses, and canned foods.

Eat foods high in potassium: Good dietary sources of potassium include bananas, potatoes, avocados, tomato juice, grapefruit juice, and acorn squash. Potassium helps maintain intracellular osmotic pressure, which is the force required to stop the flow of water across a membrane.

Use salt substitutes: Eat calcium and magnesium rich foods to help reduce blood pressure. Food sources rich in calcium include low-fat milk, green beans, sardines with bones, broccoli, spinach, and tofu. Good sources of magnesium-rich foods include any legumes and seeds, such as navy beans and sunflower seeds.

Lower saturated fat intake: Saturated fat increases the level of low density lipoproteins (LDL), which tend to stick to the sides of the arterial wall. This deposit of fat is known as atherosclerosis. Atherosclerosis begins with the accumulation of fatty streaks on the inner arterial walls. When this fatty buildup enlarges and becomes hardened with minerals, such as calcium, it forms plaque. Plaque stiffens the arteries and narrows the passages through them. Thus, blood pressure rises. This rise in blood pressure is due to the arteries' lack of elasticity.

Apart from diet, Stress is an obvious contributor to hypertension and chronic anger is especially problematic. Studies have shown that those who have developed the "habit of anger" but who are unaware of it are the most prone to hypertension. The first step of anger management is becoming aware of your own anger patterns. The following tips are also found to be very useful.

Relaxation: simple relaxation tools, such as deep breathing and relaxing imagery, can help calm down and manage physiological arousal. Once you learn the techniques, you can call upon them in any situation. If you are involved in a relationship where both partners are hot-tempered, it might be a good idea for both of you to learn these techniques. Some simple steps you can try:

• Breathe deeply, from your diaphragm; breathing from your chest won't relax you. Picture your breath coming up from your "gut."
• Slowly repeat a calm word or phrase such as "relax," "take it easy." Repeat it to yourself while breathing deeply.
• Use imagery; visualize a relaxing experience, from either your memory or your imagination.
• Practice these techniques daily. Learn to use them automatically when you're in a tense situation.

Cognitive Restructuring: means changing the way you think. Tempered people tend to curse, swear, or speak in highly colorful terms that reflect their inner thoughts. When you're irritated, your thinking can get very exaggerated and overly dramatic. Try replacing these thoughts with more rational ones. For instance, instead of telling yourself, "oh, it's awful, it's terrible, everything's ruined," tell yourself, "it's frustrating, and it's understandable that I'm upset about it, but it's not the end of the world and getting angry is not going to fix it anyhow." Be careful of words like "never" or "always" when talking about yourself or someone else. "This thing never works," or "you're always forgetting things" are not just inaccurate, they also serve to make you feel that your anger is justified and that there's no way to solve the problem. They also alienate and humiliate people who might otherwise be willing to work with you on a solution. Remind yourself that getting angry is not going to fix anything, that it won't make you feel better (and may actually make you feel worse).

Logic Defy Anger: because anger, even when it's justified, can quickly become irrational. So use cold hard logic on yourself. Remind yourself that the world is "not out to get you," you're just experiencing some of the rough spots of daily life. Do this each time you feel anger getting the best of you, and it'll help you get a more balanced perspective. Angry people tend to demand things: fairness, appreciation, agreement, willingness to do things their way. Everyone wants these things, and we are all hurt and disappointed when we don't get them, but angry people demand them, and when their demands aren't met, their disappointment becomes anger. As part of their cognitive restructuring, angry people need to become aware of their demanding nature and translate their expectations into desires. In other words, saying, "I would like" something is healthier than saying, "I demand" or "I must have" something. When you're unable to get what you want, you will experience the normal reactions — frustration, disappointment, hurt — but not anger. Some angry people use this anger as a way to avoid feeling hurt, but that doesn't mean the hurt goes away.

Problem Solving: anger and frustration might be caused by very real and inescapable problems in our lives. Not all anger is misplaced, and often it's a healthy, natural response to these difficulties. There is also a cultural belief that every problem has a solution, and it adds to our frustration to find out that this isn't always the case. The best attitude to bring to such a situation, then, is not to focus on finding the solution, but rather on how you handle and face the problem. Make a plan, and check your progress along the way. Resolve to give it your best, but also not to punish yourself if an answer doesn't come right away. If you can approach it with your best intentions and efforts and make a serious attempt to face it head-on, you will be less likely to lose patience and fall into all-or-nothing thinking, even if the problem does not get solved right away.

Better Communication: Angry people tend to jump to — and act on — conclusions, and some of those conclusions can be very inaccurate. The first thing to do if you're in a heated discussion is slow down and think through your responses. Don't say the first thing that comes into your head, but slow down and think carefully about what you want to say. At the same time, listen carefully to what the other person is saying and take your time before answering. Listen, too, to what is underlying the anger. For instance, you like a certain amount of freedom and personal space, and your "significant other" wants more connection and closeness. If he or she starts complaining about your activities, don't retaliate by painting your partner as a jailer, a warden, or an albatross around your neck.

Manage Criticism: It's natural to get defensive when you're criticized, but don't fight back. Instead, listen to what's underlying the words: the message that this person might feel neglected and unloved. It may take a lot of patient questioning on your part, and it may require some breathing space, but don't let your anger—or a partner's—let a discussion spin out of control. Keeping your cool can keep the situation from becoming a disastrous one.

Using Humor: "Silly humor" can help defuse rage in a number of ways. For one thing, it can help you get a more balanced perspective. When you get angry and call someone a name or refer to them in some imaginative phrase, stop and picture what that word would literally look like. If you're at work and you think of a coworker as a "dirtbag" or a "single-cell life form," for example, picture a large bag full of dirt (or an amoeba) sitting at your colleague's desk, talking on the phone, going to meetings. Do this whenever a name comes into your head about another person. If you can, draw a picture of what the actual thing might look like. This will take a lot of the edge off your fury; and humor can always be relied on to help unknot a tense situation. What these techniques have in common is a refusal to take yourself too seriously. Anger is a serious emotion, but it's often accompanied by ideas that, if examined, can make you laugh.

Changing Your Environment: Sometimes it's our immediate surroundings that give us cause for irritation and fury. Problems and responsibilities can weigh on you and make you feel angry at the "trap" you seem to have fallen into and all the people and things that form that trap.

Give Yourself a Break: Make sure you have some "personal time" scheduled for times of the day that you know are particularly stressful. One example is the working mother who has a standing rule that when she comes home from work, for the first 15 minutes "nobody talks to Mom unless the house is on fire." After this brief quiet time, she feels better prepared to handle demands from her kids without blowing up at them.

This is a Compiled Article