I have what seems to be an odd problem. I have low blood pressure, and
high cholesterol. I have been overweight for many years. Since the
beginning of the year, I have been going to a gym for a hour to an
hour and a half five days a week. I have also worked on my eating
habits. I have lost about 20 pounds. As my progress has been slow
despite everything, my doctor has prescribed phentermine for a limited
time. I have violent reactions to niacin, so I can't take that. Is it
unusual to have these two problems and is there anything else I can
do?

I highly recommend reading the book "Releasing Fat" by Dr. Ray Strand.
 He talks about blood pressure levels, cholesterol levels, abdominal
weight gain, in relation to high carbohydrate/high glycemic meals and
insulin resistance and subsequent type II diabetes.

It is not at all unusual to have low blood pressure and high
cholesterol: assuming you mean low normal blood pressure (over 90/60)
and high total cholesterol (over 200), or high LDL cholesterol (over
130) or high HDL cholesterol (over 60). They are separate physiologic
and medical processes, until (usually) severe cardiac atherosclerosis
or other artery hardening sets in, and then they can converge,
suddenly.

People with both may be fit and overweight; have very good cardiac
reserves; or a ticking time bomb, sadly, and good candidates for
gastric bypass.

Weight loss is correlated with LDL reduction: as you lose weight, your
LDL should come down in proportion to your HDL.

Good luck!

Top doc cholesterol lowering program (Wall Street Journal feature)
www.drjohnlapuma.com

Top doc cholesterol lowering book
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0553582100/qid=1125507055/sr=2-1/ref=pd_bbs_b_2_1/104-2797390-5065555?v=glance&s=books

Top doc low blood pressure primer
http://www.americanheart.org/presenter.jhtml?identifier=4643

I would ask your doctor to fracionate your cholesterol.

Blood pressure and cholesterol are independent risk factors for
cardiac event. Anyrate fractionating your cholesterol may help
identifying your risk factors a bit better.

Good luck.

Normally Gastric Bypass surgery

Normally Gastric Bypass surgery could be ideal for you. It blocks
stomach cutting down food consumption drastically. You can talk to
your Doctor on this . Howewer before opting for surgery you can
consider non surgical options which have similar effects. You can see
the page   http://www.prleap.com/pr/4943  for more information.