1 in 3 Americans Has High Blood Pressure

Blood Pressure Rates on Rise in U.S. Study Finds
Honestly, I think articles like this make my blood pressure rise. Ok, so one 1 in 3 Americans suffers from high blood pressure, up from 1 in 4 a decade ago... and to top it off, most don't know they have it.
I haven't been to a doctor in more than four years. I kind of lost faith in them after my mom was diagnosed with cancer. She had been sick for a while and had complained to her doctor about it, but he didn't even bother to run the appropriate tests to find her cancer. It wasn't until she was really sick, and the cancer had progressed too far, that she decided to opt for a second opinion and went to the emergency room.
Well that kind of made it hard to deny that doctors are only human and, at the very least, are prone to err just like the rest of us. I also can't help thinking about a friend of my family-- he went to the doctor for a check-up, got a clean bill of health, came home and died of a heart attack that very night. So how much faith can we really put in doctors? I've started viewing medicine more as guess work than as an exact science. I haven't been in for a check-up since 2000, and as I've had no pains or other problems that were too unbairable to cope with, I just haven't bothered going to see my doctor at all.
Now suddenly blood pressure is all over the news. The networks and local stations alike are bent on reporting it, and showing doctors and younger sufferers of high blood pressure to justify the seriousness of the problem. And I'm here, just turned 36, haven't had a recent check-up, I not only don't exercise regularly, but seldom do anything but sit on my ass all day long, and not only do I smoke, I smoke unfiltered cigarettes, because the only way I can continue to afford my habit with the rising cigarette taxes is to roll my own. Combine this with the fact that high blood pressure runs in my family and that both of my parents were diagnosed with high blood pressure in their thirties, I'm thinking maybe I should start taking this blood pressure thing more seriously.
Not only should I go to the doctor and have my blood pressure checked, but I'm suddenly finding myself motivated to quit smoking, excercise, and put myself on a heart-smart diet. Never mind that I've always had low blood-pressure... and I don't mean normal blood pressure... I mean low. Suddenly with the frequency of cautionary reporting on high blood pressure on the news, I'm obsessed with health... possibly to unhealthy proportions. I'm sitting here right now barely able to wait to have my blood pressure checked... I'm on the verge of a panic attack over it. So as I said to start with... I really think articles like this make my blood pressure rise. I'm just gonna stop paying attention to the news. I've got better things to do anyway... like joining a gym and looking up some low-fat recipes online.