High blood pressure is when your heart has to work harder than usual to push blood through your body.
Your heart is like a tiny pump, it pushes blood out of your heart and into your veins, which carry the blood all around your body. When everything works just right, your heart doesn’t have to strain too much.
Like pushing water through a hose
Imagine you're watering your garden with a hose. If the nozzle is wide open, it’s easy for the water to flow, like when your blood pressure is normal.
But if someone steps on the hose, making it narrow, the water has to push harder just to get through, that's like high blood pressure. Your heart is pushing harder because the veins are narrower or more stiff, and the blood can’t move as easily.
Sometimes, this happens for a while, maybe when you're running or excited, but if it happens all the time, your heart has to keep working extra hard, and that’s not good in the long run.
Examples
- A person feels dizzy after standing up quickly because their blood pressure suddenly drops.
- Someone with high blood pressure might feel a pounding in their head every morning.
- An elderly man is told he needs to watch his blood pressure, as it's affecting his heart.
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