Smoking and drinking can seem like fun ways to socialize, but they have detrimental effects on your health and can lead to long term health conditions. If you feel stressed out and rely on these methods to relieve your stress, look into other healthy alternatives that can be beneficial to your health, such as exercising, taking some time off, or giving yourself a break for a day. If you are already addicted and are trying to come off of smoking or drinking, there are many tools out there to help with addiction such as nicotine patches and meetings. These things are in place to allow you to have the best quality of life. Try to pick up on better habits and work towards a healthier life to stay away from cardiovascular problems in the future. 

Eating healthy doesn’t have to be constraining and can be done in moderation. You don’t need to cut out everything you enjoy eating but adding healthy options into your diet is essential in taking care of your body. Staying away from constantly eating foods high in cholesterol or sugar can be beneficial in taking care of your cardiovascular health and adding foods with fiber, protein and healthy fats is essential. 

Some foods to add into your meals can be avocados, berries, beans, whole grains, kale, spinach, dark chocolate, almonds and tomatoes. 

Managing stress can be extremely difficult, but it is important to be able to deal with stress in a healthy way. Some ways to manage stress can be planning out your day or week before it begins so you are able to manage your time more efficiently. Having a rough idea on the things that are going to occur throughput your week gives you a chance to plan for down time and rearrange things if you know certain days will be more stressful than others. 

Another way to relieve stress is by ensuring you are getting enough time throughout the day to relax. Overworking yourself can lead to being overly stressed and shutting down. Make time throughout your day to enjoy the sunlight, go for walks, and have time for yourself to do things you enjoy. 

Chocolate is actually beneficial to your heart health and contains cocoa, which has antioxidants which can help with regulating cholesterol, increasing good cholesterol and decreasing bad cholesterol. It also helps with blood clotting; however, everything is good in moderation. This definitely doesn’t mean overload with the amount of chocolate you eat, but don’t feel bad about the occasional sweet tooth!

Dark chocolate also has flavonoids which is associated with a lower risk for heart disease and casuses vascular improvements.