Quit drinking and smoking cold turkey 9 days ago and my BP is about 140s over 80s (was observed to be even higher about 72 hours in).
For reference, I’ve always had a low sodium, plant-based diet and never really had elevated blood pressure before I quit.
Just curious if this will ever go down on its own, my plan is to wait a couple weeks and see, but curious.
UPDATE: yes, well aware of stopping abruptly. I was more like a 2-5 beer/day person and had frequently stopped for a day or two without issue so wasn’t terribly worried, but I did check BP to be sure nothing wrong undetected was going on.
I didn’t have any symptoms outside of elevated BP and after checking frequently the last couple days I’m about mid 120s to 130 over 70s consistently.
So, in my own personal experience (and we are all different) it does seem that quitting both abruptly caused a temporary elevation in BP for several days.
I have been hydrating regularly (2 liters minimum of water daily, plus I eat a lot of plants with high water content anyway), yoga, cardio, Peleton. Sleeping better.
I will continue to monitor and contact my Dr if needed. I believe my annual checkup is soon anyway.
Thanks for all the responses.
I don’t know about drinking, but when you quit smoking, it will take many months for your body to heal. Expect extreme coughing, nausea and other unpleasant side effects. I went through it after more than a decade of heavy smoking and it was not fun at all. But hey, I don’t smoke for over a decade now and couldn’t be happier about it.
On many medical websites, the four pieces of advice to lower BP: 1 - weight management, 2 - cardio, 3 - minimize salt, 4 - minimize alcohol.