Drinking or eating normally raises blood pressure

For some reason, I developed hypertension quite suddenly; the only time I've ever had high blood pressure readings was when I would go to give blood and I would be just borderline hypertension because needles freak me out--my readings were right at 140/80. Since a few years back however, any time I eat a normal meal or drink the recommended amount of water, my blood pressure spikes to unhealthy levels. Like today, my blood pressure this morning was 110/70 and tonight, after drinking a decent amount of water, I can feel my pulse and my bp jumps to 150/90. The same thing happens when I eat a normal-sized meal.

So I can keep my blood pressure low by not drinking that much liquid and eating about 10 little meals a day, which is rather frustrating because I thought that drinking water would at least lower by bp. I've been through multiple tests for my heart--echo, stress test, etc--and nothing abnormal has come out of them. There is no swelling of the ankles or any other signs that I am retaining water, so what else could this be? Some weird metabolism issue?

[ed34]

I could be WAY off the mark here and I don't really want to put fear into you, but I had a similar issue in 2006. I went to the hospital several times because I was sweating so much after eating and my BP was high causing me to be dizzy. They ran a batch of tests and said it was a stomach infection. They fed me with anti-acid medication for a whole year and then I had a heart attack. The Cardiologist was furious about the mis-diagnosis, but it's apparently common. When we eat, there is an extra demand called on the heart to supply blood to the gut for digestion. I was able to do all other tasks with no problems, it was only eating or drinking which caused me problems. Have you had a cholesterol blood test done recently? Mine was off the scale and yet no Doctor managed to put 2 and 2 together to make 4, not for a whole year.

[ShinyJabberwocky]

Went to a gastroenterologist(sp) already and had an EGD done--that's where I initially thought my problems would be found. Nothing abnormal was found. I've had a cholesterol test done, and my triglycerides are higher than normal (333), but every other cholesterol number is fine.

[ed34]

If you have no discomforts and had the relevant tests, then I wouldn't worry. I'm not sure about drinking water, but here are some things which can raise blood pressure....
Exercise, and soon after exercising. Taking a bath. Within 1 hour after eating. Being cold. When your bladder is full. Drinking does give more fluids to be available for blood and this will raise pressure if pushed into the blood stream. It also seems to make a big difference with the types of foods you eat. A normal healthy diet will raise blood pressure, but the more the fat content, the higher it will raise.