PCP: Do you have hypertension in your family?
Me: Both parents. My maternal grandmother also died of a stroke.
PCP: Are you adopted?
Me: No.
PCP: Darn it.
Me: Yeah, I know.
The blood pressure is back up, and my PCP is not pleased. I am, in his words, too young to have a pressure of 140/95. I explained my past history of HTN, which I was able to resolve on my own with the help of some Norvasc. I also told him about my family history of HTN, which as you have probably guessed, was not what he wanted to hear.
The game plan is a low dose of labetalol, frequent monitoring of my BP, losing some weight, dietary changes, and once I get the go-ahead from my OB, exercise. If the weight loss, diet changes and exercise don't do it, it may be that my HTN is genetic and like it or not, I may have to live with being on an antihypertensive for the long term.
I know all of this, which is why I want to fix the HTN now. My goal is to not to have to be on an antihypertensive now...or if I am going to have to be on one, to just keep it at one and not two or three or seven.
Since I had a feeling that this visit would result in a prescription, I did a little research on what medications I could take. Labetalol was chosen as it's one of the safest for breastfeeding: it doesn't interfere with milk production and there have been no serious effects reported in infants. I've never taken a beta-blocker before. Its not 100% safe, but no drug is, alas. The other safe drugs were propanolol (another beta-blocker) and hydralazine (vasodilator). All the others were either unsafe either for milk production and/or for the infant, or had unknown safety.
As for the burn, my PCP says that it's healing very well--I've been taking excellent care of it. On Wednesday I can stop the ointment and gauze, though I may want to put a light dressing on if I'm wearing any clothing that may irritate it. It still looks horrible though.
In other news, my PCP's new medical assistant looks like a supermodel. This would have been depressing had it been a she, but it was a he. Very easy on the eyes, and sweet to boot. Every doctor's office should have one of these. I'll let him draw my blood anytime.
