I have inherited a tendency toward hypertension -- my maternal grandmother once hit 260/200 (not a typo), and my mother's BP rise during pregnancy caused me to be an emergency C-section. I have been on a tightly sodium-restricted diet since my early 20s, but this was not enough to keep me below 140/90. What I did discover in my early 30s was a powerful correlation between BP and percentage body fat -- when I went on the Pritikin (restricted fat) diet in the early 1980s, my BP dropped by about 10mm per week, all the way down to 100/60 at my best and proudest moment.

Since I suffer from white coat syndrome and since my BP varies widely, I have done a fair amount of self-monitoring over the years. I currently average about 110+/75, with which I am pretty happy.

To the plurality of folks in this poll who reported 120/80, my hypertensive grandmother, who was also an RN, would have said, "Textbook normal!"