potentially triggering discussion of personal body mass
During COVID lockdown I put on a lot of weight, the main culprit there was drinking.
me_irl, idk what a lot is for you, but I also have a family history of hypertension and gained a lot of weight during lockdown supporting my local breweries. my vitals never got to the severity you describe, but a year before rona (and every GP appt until 2022) my doc was warning me about BP and trying to get me to track it. about a year ago I stopped drinking microbrews at home and that plus portion control was enough for me to lose my rona weight and then some by the beginning of the year. my last doc appt was last fall and my BP was normal. I didn't go sober, I just switched to seltzer and the hard stuff at home (which I drink a lot less of despite my history with alcoholism), still drank craft beer when I went out to eat or whatever. I'm also pretty active by default (lots of rec sports, etc.) so that helps, and that activity was my motivation for dropping weight.
so my timeline was 20% unintentional increase in mass from 2018-2022, about a third pre-rona, two-thirds after. in six months from mid-2022 to beginning of this year I'd dropped my rona weight plus a little bit, I'm at about the body mass I was at the end of 2018 which I think is the top end of healthy for me. I haven't been near as strict about things since the beginning of the year and I've plateaued but I'm comfy with it. before 2018 I was always successful bulking but never cutting (I powerlifted for about a decade), so I was shocked that I lost so much weight without focusing on macros, calories or whatever.
good luck man, i wrote all this because I hope there's a light at the end of the tunnel for you like there was for me
potentially triggering discussion of personal body mass
me_irl, idk what a lot is for you, but I also have a family history of hypertension and gained a lot of weight during lockdown supporting my local breweries. my vitals never got to the severity you describe, but a year before rona (and every GP appt until 2022) my doc was warning me about BP and trying to get me to track it. about a year ago I stopped drinking microbrews at home and that plus portion control was enough for me to lose my rona weight and then some by the beginning of the year. my last doc appt was last fall and my BP was normal. I didn't go sober, I just switched to seltzer and the hard stuff at home (which I drink a lot less of despite my history with alcoholism), still drank craft beer when I went out to eat or whatever. I'm also pretty active by default (lots of rec sports, etc.) so that helps, and that activity was my motivation for dropping weight.
so my timeline was 20% unintentional increase in mass from 2018-2022, about a third pre-rona, two-thirds after. in six months from mid-2022 to beginning of this year I'd dropped my rona weight plus a little bit, I'm at about the body mass I was at the end of 2018 which I think is the top end of healthy for me. I haven't been near as strict about things since the beginning of the year and I've plateaued but I'm comfy with it. before 2018 I was always successful bulking but never cutting (I powerlifted for about a decade), so I was shocked that I lost so much weight without focusing on macros, calories or whatever.
good luck man, i wrote all this because I hope there's a light at the end of the tunnel for you like there was for me
how do you track it?
Either buy a BP cuff or many pharmacies have cuffs for public use. I couldn't be assed to do either.