(Not a native speaker so hope you'd be able to read it)

I developed hypertension at a relatively young age. The cause was probably genetical. I want share my experience. If you too lazy to read further - if you or somebody close to you suffer from this disease please understand: shit is serious.

You probably heard that hypertension is highly treatable condition. Just take a fucking pill. The short answer is no. Hypertension is not a cancer, but time is still your enemy.

Don't fool with hypertension. Hypertension not only causes strokes, it's destroying your kidneys, eyes, blood vessels everywhere, it's making you dumb and lethargic. If you don't treat this shit and postpone - you might be able to.

And it's quite - some people end up with neurological consequences. Head pain, "snow" vision, tinnitus. Well, in some sense they are lucky ones. Because you might not have any of those symptoms and still have an extremely high blood pressure with no particular reason.

These are the lessons that I've learned.

It's important to properly check your blood pressure.

At home. With bp monitor. Which is cheap and easy. Except many of them are lying. Even if you've read the instruction and did everything properly. I had two monitors which was consistently showing readings with bp 10 mm lower the real. That's pretty scary deal - you thing that everything is ok, but your blood pressure is actually high.

One of the common solution is to take your bp monitor to the doctor's office and compare readings. Well, sounds easy. Except many people become nervous in the doctor's office and their blood pressure gets too high. The best thing thay you can get - is found out that there is discrepancy with your home monitor and doctor's reading.

So what? This approach suggest an algorithm: you going to go to a doctor, find a discrepancy and then throw it away, buy new monitor, repeat.

The idea of proper reading might drove you nuts since blood pressure fluctuates throughout a day.

I recommend to do 24-hour blood pressure monitoring (although I heard in some countries this is expensive as fuck with price up to 500$). Then you compare it to your bp monitor.

If you are lazy as shit here is quick hint - Omron 10 series is pretty accurate judging from my experience and amazon.com reviews. However in your case and in your monitor it might not be true.

you might have secondary hypertension.

There are kidney disease, thyroid disease, pheochromocytoma. The chances of having secondary hypertension given that you have a hypertension are pretty slim. Still it worth trying. Eliminating all the secondary reasons of hypertension take enormous amount of time. But it removes additional risks. And remove false hope that 'I just have this disease so when I cure it'.

I am under a lot of stress.

This is famous denial scenario for a newcomers: "Yes, my bp high because I was under a lot of stress". No you not or just read the fucking disclaimer: everybody under a lot of stress. Stress management is important, transcendal meditation might give your blood pressure a little drop (like 5 mm). Visiting a psychotherapist, removing oneitiss out of your life. Stop being a fucking beta-cuck - all those things play an important role. Seriously, after discovering pill I realised how extremely stressful the whole betahood for a male. Not succumbing into beta role will probably give you not only more quality-life but quantity too.

Still, from my experience stress is overrated. So you could pick any random guy on the street and he'd probably say: "I'm under a lot of stress". Everybody is under a lot of stress.

But If you decide finally to deal with it - I suggest to think about Jordan Peterson words (paraphrasing): "You avoid stuff in your life which painful, boring, takes a lot of effort. But it still sits on your subconsious and creates a lot amount of pressure". Just start to deal with this shit. Solve problems one-by-one. You'd feel much better and peaceful.

The cure from stress is not some new agy buddhist bullshit like 'stop clinging to suffering and pleasure, get enlightened, etc'. No. The real cure is to handle the problems. There are no easy solutions.

Caution: if you going to treat your hypertension with psychotherapy-only and stress-management techniques you probably die from a stroke shortly.

lifting with hypertension probably bad idea

I'm not specialist on this, but when you developed hypertension - lifting, at least things like powerlifting wouldn't get you a lot of health benefits. You probably still would be able to do weight training but the weights would be more fitness-training like, not powerlifting. So no lifting bro, you would need to find alternative ways to express your masculinity.

sometimes diet helps.

For some people whose hypertension was caused by metabolical syndrome or diabetes the low-carb diet can be a tremendous help. However for many other - diet doesn't help. However you probably need to adhere a diet which might lower your hypertension.

There is huge evidence supporting DASH diet although I'm rather skeptical about it. Because it's just simply unbearable. If you going DASH you're would be hungry all the day.

manage diabetes, manage cholesterol, manage kidney problem

This one is closely related to previous. Diabetes, cholesterol and hypertension - are all self-reinforcing things.

*smoking is not so bad at least for blood pressure *

Well, I hope you don't smoke. But it turns out that smokers have lower blood pressure. Slightly. You could google this stuff.

This one is also a rookie mistake - many people diagnosed with hypertension say: "Hey, I'm just going to quit smoking and my bp gets lower". But the truth is that many ex-smokers experience blood pressure fluctuations and also become extremely fat. Which is bad.

Cease smoking carefully.

supplements might help, but probably not

There are many supplements which might improve blood pressure. Magnesium, Vitamin B6, Taurine, Arginine, Ginger tea, etc. You could experiment with them since they probably have less side effects before switching on conventional drugs. However if your bp readings is around 160 or higher, don't. Take a fucking pill, get a normal bp then experiment as much as you want.

watch what pills take

When I quit taking supplemental zinc and lower my salt intake - my bp immediately dropped by 10 points. Painkillers are also notorious for interactions with bp pills.

some pills are not working. some pills have harsh side effects

This one is pretty sad but seriously, some people are not responding for some pills. Quite a lot of people. So selecting the right pill might take a lot of time. If you're not responding after some time (10-14) days - go visit a doctor.

As for the side effects - well, it's better to deal with side-effects then to die. However you may switch from one drug to another with your doctor assistance. But never drop using meds by yourself.

exercise helps

However, again not to everybody. Basically, with an everyday exercise you can lower your blood pressure by 5-10 points. You can't go from 180 to 120 with everyday jogging. Don't bullshit yourself.

it pays in the end

Finally, when you able to manage your blood pressure you will feel a huge relief and your confidence will sky-rock. Because you just have handled a serious shit. It was scary, stressful, life-threathening, but you made it. You have legitimate reasons to feel great.