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High blood pressure damages brain long before old age
latimes.com
Reading this article has significantly raised my blood pressure.
About four years ago (when I had just turned 31), I started working at a local startup. It was the typical startup gig with huge hours and even bigger responsibility. Being somewhat dysfunctional, I began living the worst possible life. I was working huge hours, so I decided that it didn't make sense to cook. Consequently, I started eating out at least two meals a day. And, since I was working too many hours to cook, I couldn't justify going to the gym. Heck, why work out if you don't have enough time to cook???
Within a year, my body decided to rebel. I started getting weird symptoms - my chest often felt hollow, I'd get weird pains across the tops of my shoulders and through my neck, and occasionally, I would have to stop while walking up a flight of stairs. It wasn't because I was out of breathe, rather, it was because my head would start to spin and I was afraid that I'd fall.
Being stubborn, I put off going to the doctor. But, eventually, I started having bigger symptoms and I had to go. My blood pressure was extremely high. So high that my doctor took two readings, then took me into another office to try a different machine. I'll never forget that conversation:
- "Greg, your blood pressure is very high." - "How high?" - "High enough that if you keep doing what you're doing, you will have a stroke."
Hearing the word 'stroke' when you are 32 years old is a pretty big shock to the system. So, I made some changes. I went back to the gym. I started cooking. I cut my salt intake drastically. Things settled down...
But, as they often do, stress started creeping back into my life and my habits started to slip. My attendance at the gym started to drop off. My eating habits started to slip.
Things culminated one horrifying morning, when I was sitting at my desk at work and things went....well, uh...things went. Half of my body went totally numb. I looked at my computer and, even though I knew it was a computer, I could not, for the life of me, remember what the heck it was called.
There I was...33 years old and I saw a computer in front of me. I knew what it was for. I knew what I could do with it. But I could not, for the life of me, remember that it was called a computer. I'll never forget the sheer terror of that moment.
My company's Biz Dev guy rushed me to the hospital, where I got to experience a full battery of tests. Thankfully, it wasn't a stroke, but it was freakishly close. I am a touch claustrophobic so they were afraid that a CT scan would elevate my blood pressure, so they drugged me. The combination of extreme fear and a heavy dose of Ativan was unlike anything I have ever experienced. When I'm afraid of things, I like to intellectualize. I like neuroscience a whole lot, so, until the Ativan kicked in, I was rapidly going through my symptoms and trying to localize them to a region of my brain. Once the Ativan kicked in, I knew that I should likely do, uh, something, but uh, yeah, oh wow, this is, uh, pretty relaxing and.....
Long story short, I did not have a stroke. Rather, my blood pressure went through the roof and my body decided to flip the reset button. I took blood pressure medication for awhile and, with my doctor's help, eventually got off of it.
Now, I live differently, but I still see my inner demon trying to make me sick again. The old habits - working too much, exercising too little, and eating out a little too often - still rear their head. But, this time, I know that if I don't take care of myself, I might end up in the hospital again.
Sorry for writing so much, but I wanted to share my story. We are involved in a very stressful industry and, though I don't know many of you, I care about all of you. Please be healthy.
For now it's just an interesting correlation, and it's kind of disappointing to see the Heart Association making recommendations based on it, particularly since the evidence for the benefits of reducing salt intake is so weak.
I wonder how factors associated with high blood pressure, such as diet and exercise, also contribute to the damages on the brain.
As far as diet and exercise go, researchers from UCLA conducted an experiment. They found that (in mice) a high fat diet reduces the level of brain derived neurotrophic factors. These levels are a predictor of how well you will learn. However, exercise can counteract these effects.
Dehydration causes a range of neurological problems. Essentially, if you don't have enough water to cleanse your system, your body starts using amino acids. These amino acids would normally be used up building neurotransmitters, so, this can cause all sorts of problems, from what resembles ADHD, to depression, or even conditions that look like autoimmune disorders.