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I used to be stubborn…I can almost hear some of my longtime peeps laughing…AKA…Mama…Bertha…and…the rest of you know who you are…okay…I’m still a little stubborn…but as I…mature…I prefer to refer to it as…set in my ways…

Bertha…brought this up last night for some reason…I was just minding my own business…drying my toes after my bath…and bam…this memory came to me…anyway…it just felt like a story I should share…

Several years ago…I started to have issues with my blood pressure…now…I’d always been one of those folks who had a very nice…low…blood pressure…even when I was pregnant…it was like 80/50 for several months…so the fact that it had crept up to something like 140/90 was quite significant…

I was frustrated…I didn’t want to take blood pressure medicine…I didn’t want to be labeled…hypertensive…so…I tried the diet and exercise thing…for several months…to no avail…my readings were still what once had been considered…high normal…and were now considered…high…with the new guidelines…

I was discussing this with my sister one day…and I remember commenting…I just don’t want hypertension on my medical record…it looks so bad…to which she replied in a most…Berthaly…manner…and…stroke looks better

Touché…I went back to the doctor…got the medicine…and got my blood pressure under control…and I’ve kept it there ever since…

Now…interestingly…since I am the nurse…and she is the school teacherly type…you’d have thought that conversation would have gone in the opposite direction…but…it didn’t…that’s the thing about life…we don’t always see the forest for the trees…especially when it comes to our own health…

Thankfully…I have that famous woodswoman…Bertha…and a pretty smart sister or two…to point out the forest from time to time…

Jane