This week, I am fresh from the Connecticut Naturopathic Phyiscians Association conference. So much to learn! I did a redux of the first few talks. We started with inflammatory bowel disease, moved on to natural treatment of cancer, then tick borne illness, then a great talk about herbs for cardiovascular disease. I am so grateful to my colleagues for putting together such helpful, informative talks!

This week, I started talking about the very important topic of hypertension, high blood pressure. Our focus this week was on basic lifestyle things to do to lower blood pressure. Some of it is SHOCKING! Stuff like: eat more vegetables and fruit, eat more clean protein, drink more water, get more exercise, stop smoking, do stress reducing activities like deep breathing, leisure walks in nature, yoga, and meditation, and get good quality and quantity of sleep. WHO WOULDA THUNKIT??? It's so important that we'll pick up on this next week, and include actual supplements that help with blood pressure.

This week, we found that Ron is plugging along and had a not-so-good day because yesterday he dared to work in the yard. His poor muscles just don't want to be disturbed! We are hoping that this will just take time and he'll be back to his favorite activities soon. As for me, my tremors have been quiet, and I'm hoping that's in part due to the low dose lithium orotate, and that the herbs are working to clear any remnants of tick borne illness! However, I have to face that I have hereditary hypertension. All the supplements and stress-reducing activities are just not working to get my blood pressure into a safe zone. So, I'm going to try a low dose of an angiotensin receptor blocker. My mom and sister are both on blood pressure meds and they work well for them. My mom is also on an ARB but my sister is on a pair of diurectics. I am taking an ARB because they are safer for athletes, in that they don't dehydrate you nor reduce your cardiac output. More about hypertension next week!

It's SPRING, and that means beautiful flowers, trees, and POLLEN! So we did a nice review of what to do for your respiratory allergies. Neti pots, supplements, nasal sprays, foods, we've got it all!