My Bac Adventure

[seeking_serenity]

My Bac Adventure

Boo, Grommet! That sucks. I hope it's just a temporary setback.

[Bruunhilde]

My Bac Adventure

Oh Grommet, I'm so sorry, you must be devastated.

However, since we are all together one big research project, you are perhaps the canary in the coalmine, and maybe the gas will dissipate.

The one thing I hold on to when I consider the setbacks, is that people including me who have had to lower dose for SE reasons, have been able to tit back up with fewer SEs at a later date. It's like the body is not as sensitive the next time around. For me, I lowered the dose for one day twice, from 50 to 25 and back, and it helped me with the SEs. Maybe that will happen with the BP too.

You have helped me by pointing out the hypertensive issues, because I'm a case study in weird (unexplained) hypertension. The docs didn't know what to do with me except alot of invasive tests when I was in my early 20's and had high BP. They couldn't figure anything out. Female, 23, exercises, eats right, doesn't drink much (binging, so it's all relative). It crossed their eyes. I have tried soooooo many things to lower it without drugs, but have not had the success with hypertension that I had with cholesterol lowering.

Anyways, sorry for the diatribe. I really want to hear your path and support you.
:thanks:

Tits may be down, but the knob will go up! (not sure if that applies to you, but just trying to look at the bright side).

By the way, calcium, fish oil and some other stuff help with the hypertension, you may want to try adding them in.

[Sunnyvalenting]

My Bac Adventure

Grommet,
Please note that alcohol can raise the BP too as can alcohol withdrawal. Don't know if either fits your situation. Good luck
S

[bleep]

My Bac Adventure

Shit Grommet, that really sucks. I'm sorry.

Hopefully, as Bruun says, this is just a temporary set-back, and you can come back to sort it out at a later date.

Keep us informed as to how it goes.

Bummer.

[Grommet]

My Bac Adventure

Now this may get interesting. My doc friend JUST called. I am postng this quickly, typos be dammed.

For background, he is chief of staff for internal medicine for a major midwest US teaching hospital He was working today when we talked, and on his way out he asked one of his residents to research high dose Bac and HBP. The resident asked if it was for AL tretament (no shit!). Apparently, this he was familiar with OA and and has an interest in high dose Bac as an addiction treatment. These guys are internists, not surgeons.

He just called from a reataurant and seemed excited. He was my freshamn roomate and over the years we have kept in loose touch. When I started Bac I called him (very difficult) but he was supportive and very interested. Never heard of OA but was not concernced with Bac at high doses long as I always had enough on hand for a safe titration down.

Anyhoo, at the moment I may be their lab rat. Cooooolllll!

seeking_serenity;1054836 wrote: Boo, Grommet! That sucks. I hope it's just a temporary setback.

No worries Serneity, it will be temprary. Its nice to know I always have Bac in my Bac pocket.

Bruunhilde;1054844 wrote:

However, since we are all together one big research project, you are perhaps the canary in the coalmine, and maybe the gas will dissipate. .
Yes, see above!

Bruunhilde;1054844 wrote:

Anyways, sorry for the diatribe. I really want to hear your path and support you.
:thanks:

Are you kidding? Never apologize for the diatribe and I know of your support!Sunnyvalenting;1054850 wrote: Grommet,
Please note that alcohol can raise the BP too as can alcohol withdrawal. Don't know if either fits your situation. Good luck
S

Great point. We talked alot about this today. But I have gone from 85 units/week to about 20 units with 4 or 5 days each week AF and it has been many weeks since the drop. He was really focused on this, for exactly this reason. But it does not seem to be the case. But who knows?

[bleep]

My Bac Adventure

That sounds pretty positive. It will be interesting to see what effect this will have on your drinking. It really helps having a professional interested in your case.

Being a guinea pig is better than being no pig at all!

[Grommet]

My Bac Adventure

We're going to talk again tomorrow. Can't wait.

Just went upstairs and told my wife that Bleep said I'm a guinea pig, not a pig. She said who the hell is Bleep, your still a pig in mybook :H , and if you don't quit with the Bac drama I'm going back on the pain meds! (at least with the broken leg she has not lost her sense of humor).

[gratitude]

My Bac Adventure

grom,
good. luck. I'm sure you guys will sort it out and that you have all the angles covered.maybe the high blood pressure is from all this newly added responsibility? Perhaps you could convince your wife to hurry up and recover so it can be about you again. see how that goes over. hahaha.
keep posting will you? gratitude

[Grommet]

My Bac Adventure

Quick follow up. My doc friend is not my prescribing physician. I never asked him as I did want to put our relationship at risk,

I am self-prescribed through Goldpharma. He did say I do not need to titrate down if my primary was aware of my Bac usage. I have my annual physical coming up soon and have decided NOT to have a "come to Jesus" with my primary. There is a good reason for this, and I will elaborate if anyone is interested.

His point is there may be a series of tests, and if your not going to tell your primary about the Bac then be off it before hand.

Time to hit the hay, good night all.

[bleep]

My Bac Adventure

Grommet, clearly you have your thoughts on this issue, but from where I am sitting, if I have one guy responsible for my health and wellbeing, I'd want him to know about it. All his advice is going to be clouded by the fact that he thinks you drink 10 beers a night, and so will be largely irrelevant to your current situation. Perhaps he might even be able to help, if he knows the full story.

My reasons would have to be pretty powerful for me to not tell him about the biggest chemical change my body had ever experienced.

[Grommet]

My Bac Adventure

You're right Bleep. Damn. We'll see where the conversation goes.

I'm still going to work down the Bac. If my BP goes back to normal I'll be really pissed off :H

[Isolde]

My Bac Adventure

Grommet, that really blows!
Like Bruun, I was diagnosed as hypertensive in my 20s, baffling my doctors as well. I didn't realize until later that it was "mostly" because I was drinking nightly. If I could get a few AF days under my belt, then my bp would drop back down into the normal range. But I was put on the lowest level of bp med and it has been very well (110/70) since, even w/the high dose bac.

The other day I was reading bac side effects on some other site (I think I was looking for an interaction or something), and I saw that becoming HYPOtensive was one! I said to myself, "That is absolute BULLSHIT!" My bp increased from bac at a time when it should have been dropping due to stopping drinking, and the same thing has happened to others here at MWO as well.

Ideally, I want to get off of my high bp meds. I'm hoping that with natural remedies and getting to a lower dose of bac that I'll eventually be able to do that.

Have you considered the possibility of taking a high bp med for a short period of time, until you get to a maintenance dose of bac? Obviously, that'll have to come from your primary, and if you don't tell him about the bac use, he may really be concerned about your high bp. So that is a bit of a pickle. Or just DON'T tell him about bac, keep taking it, have him put you on high bp meds for now, but keep monitoring it yourself at home. And when it starts to drop in relation to your bac dose, try taking less of the bp med until you're eventually off of it.

I came across a book recently about natural ways to get your high bp under control. You might want to take a look. I've put off buying it for now because mine is well controlled with the med that I'm already on. But you (and some others here!) might want to take a look:
Amazon.com: The Blood Pressure Miracle (9781606930427): Frank Mangano, Steve G. Jones: Books
Oooh, I didn't realize they had it for Kindle and it's even cheaper. I might look into it after all! It's got 61 5 star reviews on Amazon, so that says a lot! Actually, until now I thought it was an ebook available only on the guy's site, didn't know it was on Amazon until I checked just now. Now I'm even more intrigued! Maybe it'll be a good place to start.

I absolutely cannot remember who it was (I want to say Rusty, but I could be wrong) who suggested that supplementing w/magnesium was a way to help lower bp. Who knows, maybe that's in the book. It's hard for me to test natural methods while I'm still taking the bp med though!

What I'm trying to say Grom, is that you needn't let the high bp necessarily derail your bac journey. You're so close now, I think that exploring your bp lowering options first might be the better way to go. :l

By the way, congrats on being a guinea pig!! Your wife's comment about bleep's post had me cracking up! :H

Let us know how it goes!

[Grommet]

My Bac Adventure

Thanks for all the info Is. I just checked online and our local library has the book you suggested. I think you are right on with going the natural remedy route at least until my physical. I'm getting my pre-physical blood work done Friday.

You're also right about putting myself in a bit of a pickle regarding talking to my primary about this now that HBP has cropped up. But I don't want to weave any more tangled webs.

She is actually progressive and very empathetic. Yes, my primary is a woman. I found it makes the prostate exam more tolerable. Another reason to reduce the Bac before my appt. Otherwise I can see our conversation going something like this:

"So Doc, I'm glad I got the Bac thing off my chest. You said you know nothing about Bac SE's. Well, there is one good one. So before we start that part of the exam, I think we would both be more comfortable if we dimmed the lights and opened a bottle of wine."

[Bruunhilde]

My Bac Adventure

LOL Grommet, how about two bottles? "Bleep said...etc" conversation with your wife vastly amusing, LOL. Wish I had someone to share with outside MWO. Sometimes I get so relaxed because of you guys, letting it all hang out here, I forget to filter my comments to people not in the AL know in my life, those that don't know my problem is a big one.

Is, thanks for the book recommendation. I'll have to look and see the Amazon reviews for the 8 week cholesterol cure guy, I bet it's the same set of supplements and I know the cholesterol one worked except that I stopped with the Enduracin due to worries about liver toxicity. He wrote a book on hypertension a while back that I've been flirting with. Amazon.com: The Blood Pressure Cure: 8 Weeks to Lower Blood Pressure without Prescription Drugs (9780470124161): Robert E. Kowalski: Books but it doesn't have as many 5 * ratings as your guy. He does say the following, to quote a reviewer "Kowalski said he has five secret weapons. The first is a tomato extract called lycomato, a product made by several different brands.
Kowalski said that in two separate studies, "(Patients) took one pill (of lycomato) a day and it brought their blood pressure down eight to 11 points."
Kowalski said the next step is to have a nightly cup of cocoa -- not the mixes, but real cocoa filled with polyphenols -- and the darker the cocoa the better. He said to make it with skim milk and a little sweetener.
"What it does is relax the lining of the arteries called the endothelium, making it more flexible and pliable so that the blood can more easily flow through," he said.
The third step in the process is to take arginine, an amino acid. Kowalski said it's a precursor to nitric oxide.
"The nitric oxide again causes the lining of the artery to expand and relax," he said.
Kowalski said that because arginine is metabolized rapidly, he recommends a sustained release formula.
But a warning comes with arginine. In Kowalski's book, he warned about a Johns Hopkins study of arginine and heart attack patients.
"There were six deaths in the arginine group and no deaths in the placebo group. So, my recommendation would be not to use this until more studies show that it is safe," said Dr. Charles Cummings, a Baltimore cardiologist from Mid-Atlantic Cardiovascular.
The fourth step on Kowalsi's list includes taking MegaNatural BP grape seed extract. The extract is sold under a number of brand names. Kowalski's book cited studies that showed an eight- to 11-point drop in blood pressure.
No. 5 on Kowalski's list was pycnogenol, an antioxidant made from pine trees. He said it's another nitric oxide producer.
"Here's my little trick. (It's kind of like a) salt substitute. Instead of being sodium chloride, it's potassium chloride," he said. "

Note I have all of these supplements except the lycopene but I don't take them regularly, of course, but when I did, I did not have a miracle.

Sunny, good point about the AL and BP, I knew that, just keep pushing it back in my mind and covering with full bottle of wine.

[Murphyx]

My Bac Adventure

Grommet;1055168 wrote:
"So Doc, I'm glad I got the Bac thing off my chest. You said you know nothing about Bac SE's. Well, there is one good one. So before we start that part of the exam, I think we would both be more comfortable if we dimmed the lights and opened a bottle of wine."

PMSL!!! :moon: