There was a time when I thought I knew what it meant to be healthy. I was younger then and much thinner too. I swam five hours per day, 5 days per week, lifted weights three times per week and competed on weekends. I loved training, especially the long, grueling, descending interval sets when I could lock into a rhythm and just go, racing the guys in the lanes next to me.
At times I ate really well, but mostly, my diet was crap, filled with diet coke and fast food typical of my generation. I was on birth control pills (high dose, back then), allergy pills (the ones recalled for the risk of heart attack), topped with regular doses of ibuprofen to compensate for training pain and monthly menstrual hell. But I looked good and could compete with the best of them so I thought I was healthy.
Though I knew it wasn’t normal for a teenager or an early 20 something to have high blood pressure and pass out periodically, I neither considered those symptoms as signs of ill-health nor as side-effects of the medications and dietary choices I had made. I had, and still have, a resting heart rate in low the 50 beats per minute – how could someone with such good cardiovascular training be unhealthy? How could someone who was slim and muscular be unhealthy? The blood pressure, the black outs must be a fluke, I reasoned. And the monthly menstrual pain, well, that was normal right? All women writhe on the bathroom floor once a month.
It was years before I began connecting the dots between my symptoms, my diet and the meds. It took even longer for me to question my definitions of health. What does it mean to be healthy? Is it about weight? Many of us tell ourselves that health is all about weight, especially women. I am guilty of this even now. Does weight really correspond to health? Is health something that simple? Certainly, at the extreme ends of weight, there are significant, linear correlations between health and weight, but for the rest of us who fall somewhere in the middle it is not that clear cut.
We know now that body mass index or BMI, the shorthand calculation that most physicians use to determine obesity and by association ill-health, falls short for most athletes, many women, and is especially problematic for older women and men because it doesn’t consider muscle mass. Neither does it consider fitness level nor cardiovascular health, the primary driver for most weight loss campaigns. If weight is not correlated with these other measures of health, one has to wonder if weight is sufficiently sensitive to gauge human health. Perhaps, it is not.
Using myself as an example, I have learned over the years that my blood pressure is sensitive to many medications and toxicants. I cannot take oral contraceptives or I suspect synthetic hormones of any sort. Micronized progesterone landed me in the hospital. Pregnancy also increased my blood pressure exponentially, though it is likely that this was exacerbated by the tocolytics given to slow my contractions and my diet which was low salt but high carbs (sugars).
I cannot take cold medicines (pseudo-ephedrine). Vaccines too spike my blood pressure. Heck, if I am not careful with my coffee intake (I would be better off quitting altogether), that too spikes my blood pressure. As a result, I rarely if ever take any medications now but this was not so for the first 40 some odd years of my life. To say this was a long process, would be an understatement. I, like most of us, tell myself lies about my healthiness. I have always considered myself healthy, even in the face of evidence to the contrary. Now, I know better.
Was my weight ever correlated with my blood pressure? Perhaps, sometimes, but even though my weight has fluctuated dramatically over the last decades, if I dig a little deeper, I can always find another more plausible reason for the increased blood pressure; generally an illness, in itself a stressor, but often one requiring a medication known to increase blood pressure. What is so sad about this realization is that no physician ever made these connections (not even between the oral contraceptives and blood pressure), preferring instead to treat my blood pressure as an entirely discrete entity and with medications that invariably lowered my blood pressure, but also tanked my heart rate into the 30s-40s, something I knew was not safe. And the blood pressure medications working by different mechanisms that didn’t lower my heart rate, well, they had far too many serious side effects. To consider taking any of those meds for the rest of my life was out of the question, at least to me. The cardiologists, on the other hand, had no problem piling on medication after medication.
So when we go back the question of health markers, are weight and blood pressure sufficiently sensitive to detect ill-health? The answer is yes and no. While weight is sometimes associated with high blood pressure, I would suspect both weight and blood pressure are markers of other illnesses or medication reactions. Remove or reduce the burden of those illnesses and blood pressure as well as other indices of heart disease and inflammatory disease processes may diminish as well.
How do we do this? Well, diet and lifestyle contribute immensely. For me, diet has been huge. Using myself as an example again, when I was younger, I was slim and athletic, but had very high blood pressure. My diet was crap back then and I used medications known to exacerbate blood pressure. I am now much heavier (almost obese by BMI standards), still very athletic (currently, CrossFit 4-5 times per week; previously water polo, running, spin) and through diet (non-processed, no sodas, no gluten, only organic vegetables, fruits and proteins) and nutrient supplements, I have maintained ‘normal’ blood pressure, perhaps for the first time in my life. Sure, I’d like to lose 40 pounds or so and maybe at some point my body will begin releasing those fat stores, but it really doesn’t matter. I am healthy and completely medication free, not even ibuprofen for training pain.
Long story short, when we think about health, what it is and what it isn’t, addressing medications, diet and lifestyle (exercise) variables are critical. I always had the exercise component in my favor, but diet and medication use has been problematic. I have recently come to understand, that if we have symptoms ‘requiring’ medications, then we are not healthy, no matter what we tell ourselves and how good we look in those tight or not so tight jeans. In fact, those meds are probably masking and/or exacerbating the real causes of ill-health. Instead of piling on more and more medications, begin disentangling the root of your symptoms, address dietary problems, nutrient insufficiencies and lifestyle variables. I suspect for many of us, with a bit of detective work combined with some lifestyle adjustments, health is within reach. It just may not look like what we have been conditioned to believe it should.
This post was published originally on March 11, 2015.
Postscript: in the three years since writing this post, I still maintain a healthy diet and blood pressure, save except for my bout with turmeric induced hypertension (even ‘healthy’ supplements can have some interesting effects on BP). I still workout regularly, though now my sport is powerlifting, where I hold several world records in the old lady divisions. And I weigh more now than I ever have in my life, except during the last week of a pre-eclamptic twin pregnancy where I exploded with water weight. The muscle mass I have gained has moved me ever closer to the BMI obese category. Despite what the scale says, however, I am skinnier than I have been long time and I am certainly fitter and stronger. At 50, I am healthier than I was in my 20s. Diet and lifestyle are critical to health. BMI is not.
We Need Your Help
Hormones Matter needs funding now. Our research funding was cut recently and because of our commitment to independent health research and journalism unbiased by commercial interests we allow minimal advertising on the site. That means all funding must come from you, our readers. Don’t let Hormones Matter die.
Thank you! Just Discovered hormonesmatter and love it. (And that’s putting it mildly.) It reaffirms my faith in us as a species. Which even an optimist like myself desperately needs on occasion.
As a personal trainer I’ve been an athlete and gym rat for 50 years. Something I’ve learned training wise that you may find interesting: I pay attention to my sympathetic nervous system. Specifically I’ve learned to try to stay sympathetic for as brief a time as I can. I want to keep my cortisol response in deep check- I found the key to strength and fitness is to initiate muscle protein synthesis and then stop! Workout over. 15min Hard intense brief workouts taking advantage of a powerful concentric movement coupled with a much slower eccentric movement. Science has found that the lowering of the weight ups muscle protein synthesis the most – especially triggering the M-tor. response. I used to overtrain-exhausting myself- All by staying sympathetic far too long. I was using up a tremendous amount of energy and resources. Way more than necessary. In fact I was putting myself in a catabolic state. The opposite of the anabolic state all athletes want. My hormones CNS mitochondria etc drained. Believing the length and number of sets I did was all important. Besides I thought, if I ate enough protein I could compensate for anything. Ive learned over trial and error intensity and volume of training are inversely related. The body cant do both simultaneously. (at least not successfully and healthfully for long) After the workout I want to be in an anabolic state as quickly as possible. Meaning I want a fast transition from my sympathetic workout state so I can turn down my cortisol response. I want return to my parasympathetic PNS- so I’ll now do a brief meditation. Long, light slow inhales and exhales This Controlling of our breathing is the one willful conscious override we have to our HPA axis! Think on that for a moment. A few minutes of controlled slow meditative breathing. Especially emphasizes a long slow exhale which will keep carbon dioxide in our body longer- dilating our blood vessels. Carbon dioxide I’ve found is way more than a waste gas.
As far as supplements go – I take BCAA’s with Creatine and magnesium. Magnesium itself is amazing for blood pressure. And as for blood pressure drink plenty of water. Our body will hrdrate itself If it sees an emergency by stealing water from our blood, not good. Blood is approx 90% water— This now thickened blood will take a higher blood pressure to move through us. And Thanks to you guys I also now take extra thiamine!
Go hard and go brief. And keep up the amazing work. Look forward to buying the book! Thank you
Glad you like it. Given your background, any chance you might want to write an article or two about these relationships?
As far as training – I have learned a lot in recent years. Training and competing as a 50 year old is entirely different than as a 20 year old, perhaps it shouldn’t be in principle though. Recovery has become incredibly important and as you mention the balance between volume and heavy weights and not doing both per se (although, now almost everything is heavy). When I was younger and really until I became interested in powerlifting, volume was king and, recovery only happened when absolutely necessary (exhaustion). Now, there is much more balance, I have set recovery days. Period. As much as I like to train, I have to force myself to recover. And as result, my training capacity and capacity to lift heavier weights has gone up considerably.
Finally, it’s interesting that you mention breathing – coming to weightlifting as a lifelong swimmer, learning to breath differently has been a challenge, learning to alternate between that intensity and relaxation sympathetic/parasympathic has been interesting process. In swimming, as with perhaps any sport that involves long periods of exertion in oxygen deficit, the training tends towards maximum efficiency/minimal effort, using only what you need to use and staying in that relaxed state while somehow moving through the water as quickly as possible. The breathing is conserved, for lack of a better word. In contrast, lifting is an entirely different animal. Everything has to be activated simultaneously. It’s all on or all off. The breathing is anything but conserved and relaxed – it’s aggressive.
Thank you so much for the invitation to submit an article.I haven’t really written anything. I always considerd myself a guy with a strong back and a weak mind! But I do see things and work like a detective.
I guess teaching zen meditation and being a personal trainer gives me a rather unique lens.
It’s so great that you are a powerlifter! I discovered you through the guest article you did on Dr Russell Schierlings great website. I too am obsessed with among other things our mitochondria. (Which is adapting to your lifting 24/7
Please let me know how I can submit an article!
Here’s the link to contact me. Send me a note and we can chat. Would be great to do something on breathing and resetting the nervous system. https://www.hormonesmatter.com/write-for-hormones-matter/
I loved your article! One more time, it proves that people get wiser with age. At least, we women do!