ProHipHop Phase 4: Hypertension, Stress Reduction & My Future

Two days ago I found out that I may have hypertension due to some friendly encouragement to have my blood pressure taken.  After getting a surprisingly high reading for the first time in my life, I borrowed my friend’s blood pressure monitor (or whatever it’s called, it doesn’t matter) and have been checking my pressure and pulse at various points throughout the day.

The good news is that coffee doesn’t seem to be having a negative effect and I’m finding more recent studies that confirm or, at least, support that perspective.  That’s good, cause I can’t give coffee up completely, though I’ve decided to reduce my intake for other health reasons.

However, my coffee addiction is a reminder of why I believe I’ve developed hypertension (seeing the doctor is one of the next steps in assessment).  Since I started netweed, later followed by ProHipHop and Hip Hop Press, I’ve been spending a lot of time at the computer, especially with ProHipHop.  I regularly put in 25 to 35 hours a week, just on ProHipHop alone, in addition to my other projects.

That combination of grinding at the desk and pushing on even when I didn’t feel so great, giving up exercise and related practices out of personal negligence and a shifting context (I used to dance then taught tai chi & yoga during my doctoral studies but have moved out of those worlds since graduating), plus having a volatile personality, apparently have combined to produce high blood pressure.  We’ll see what the doc says but there are things I can start on immediately.

I’m already embarking on lifestyle changes that include the DASH eating plan, a fairly commonsense approach to a healthy diet.  Since I’ve been focusing on marketing lately, I decided to check out Public Service Announcements and found an MP3 of an audio PSA put out by the National Institutes of Health.

Oddly enough, although DASH stands for Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension, the use of phrases like "dash to the produce aisle for fruits and vegetables" in the PSA negatively impact my initial reaction to discovering that I have or may have some specific health condition.  Typically my initial reaction involves the feeling that I’m probably going to drop dead at any moment or that I will somehow survive and live a life of intense misery and the thought of rushing about doesn’t help that reaction.

While that’s a bit overly dramatic at this stage, without lifestyle changes and whatever additional treatment may be necessary, I know of plenty of examples of people whose lives have been ruined by heart attacks and strokes as a result of hypertension.  As I get older, these examples are far less distant than they once were.

So it’s been rather easy for me to feel like I’ve been falling apart the last couple of days and, in my case, that often includes lashing out in an aggressive manner at people who don’t really mean to be causing me pain (at least, as far as I know) with their statements about my work or critical abilities.

Though stress reduction may or may not impact the underlying conditions of hypertension, it’s something I need to include in the mix, one which requires me to stop dashing about and to focus in on my core needs and values.

I’m not going to get into much more of what I’m learning about hypertension but, if you’re concerned about such issues, you may find the MedlinePlus materials on high blood pressure a good place to start.  As with so many diseases with lifestyle aspects, most recommended lifestyle changes are good things to be doing anyway.

But this realization is also making me recognize that I need to go ahead and begin the transition at ProHipHop that will allow me to do some more extended writing offline, for print.  If all goes well (I’ve got an agent!), I’ll have a book contract before too awfully long.  If not, I still have books I need to write and work that I’ve put off for too long, that will require me to reduce my responsibilities here at ProHipHop.

I’m not exactly sure what that means for ProHipHop other than it won’t be a trade blog that attempts to follow and assess the large amount of material that I wade through on a daily basis and filter for inclusion here, at least, not in the same way.  Hopefully, it will bring a new focus to my current exploration of hip hop marketing, an exploration that has already born fruit in unexpected ways.

At the moment, I’m playing this by ear as I assess my current situation.  ProHipHop will become something a bit different but hopefully will still be worthy of attention.

And Clyde?  Well, I think I need to go take a walk and practice tai chi in the park before the day starts heating up.

Check you later.