Controlling Blood Pressure

[Guest]

I'm curious to know what you do about high blood pressure. For the people who have pots with high blood pressure what do you take or what do you do that helps. I'm noticing my blood pressure is high when I stand up and I'm getting pressure in my head and temples. I'm also taking propranolol to slow my heart rate down. It is supposed to lower blood pressure as well but I don't know if it's working. I was told I had pots about 2 months ago but I'm not sure what kind I have but I believe I have the Hyperadrenergic kind.
I'm getting surges of norepinephrine adrenaline episodes especially in the middle of the night. Making me feel extremely anxious like I wanna crawl out of my body for no reason.
When I stand up I feel heavy and my head feels full.

[MomtoGiuliana]

Yes POTS patients can have high blood pressure. Or very changeable blood pressure too. That was one problem for me for awhile. For me a beta blocker knocked my bp down to a good level. It took several days or more as I recall, from when I started it.

It might help to keep a log of your bp to share with your doctor, if you are concerned about it. You might talk to your doctor about the proper way to take your bp when standing and what times of day, etc.

[ks42]

Yes, that was a huge issue for me, especially in the beginning.

Oddly (and this is somewhat unusual) because of the type of HyperPOTS I have, the beta blockers actually caused my blood pressure to go up even more, so we had to stop them. What actually helped was taking something that helped lower my adrenaline output. For me, that ended up being Klonopin. I noticed much more stable blood pressures after I got to a good dose. However, I've also discussed things like Clonidine (helps with POTS and lowers adrenaline/norepinephrine) and labetalol (alpha/beta blocker that lowers BP a little better in hyper POTS supposedly) with my docs. Haven't started these yet, but I know they're helpful for some people with orthostatic hypertension.

[ishaqamina]

I didn't tolerate Beta blockers very well when I tried them to help reduce my heart rate. I hated them and they made me very ill.

I went for an appointment yesterday and my gp decided to put me on BP meds due to high readings the past few visits.

Most bp meds he said probably weren't suitable for me due to them being geared towards the heart, often making my tachy worse and adding extra symptoms.

He decided to try me on Indapamide .A not so popular type of bp med but one he thought logically would be suitable for me, as a POTsy as its action mechanisms are the kidneys, not the heart.

This med is a diuretic and lowers bp by making your body get rid of salt stores and water in the body and muscles. This relaxes the muscles which in turn reduces BP.

Electrolytes need monitoring while on this med.

He's hoping that reducing BP will also bring my HR back to normal functional POTS mode of 110. Its been around 130-160 since my BP's been high.

I'm only on day 2 but so far so good. My HR seems lower already, no nasty side effect like the Beta blockers which I REALLY felt the effects of. Generally feeling MUCH better than I did 2 days ago. Got up 6.30, did the school run, cooked, cleaned,prayed. A good productive day basically compared to waking at 1.00pm, watching Netflix all day, not being able to get out of bed due to excessive hr of 130+ and feeling shaky, jittery, heavy headed, groggy and tired.

Overall I would say at this point its a med geared in the right direction for the lowering of High Blood pressure

[ishaqamina]

In addition to my last post.

I've just noticed what you said about the night time anxiety.

I experienced this for a long period of time. I couldn't sleep till around 3-4 am and I felt as you've described. I would have to say this for me personally is my worst symptom. I find this feeling unbearable. The anxiety and insomnia combination can make you feel terrible.

Whats worked for me is a small dose of quetiapine every night . 25mg. Within an hour you'll be asleep. I take it at around 9.00 and by 10 i'm asleep.

A normal sleep routine makes a massive difference to your day. Obviously I still experience anxiety but not to that extreme extent as sleep puts an end to it before it gets to that unbearable point.