Kickas.org Forums Treatments, Drugs and Alternatives NSD and diet-related; Cholesterol Tests and a High Fat Diet

i understand that, juggling all these health things, so important to pick our battles, prioritizing. when i switched to a LSD, i didn't want to replace the starches with fatty red meats (this was a decision i made for myself) so i increased my intake of fish, especially the fatty fishes, and continued to eat chicken, but not more red meat. i also continue to eat eggs in moderation. what i did was start eating nuts, increase my veggies, and keep eating the fruit. for now, i think this diet is working, though if i have to lower my LDLs, may have to rethink the whole thing. and the exercise, there have been stretches where i can't even take a walk for weeks if not months, usually due to the SI, sometimes due to the knees, rarely due to the feet, as bad as they get, walking seems to help them most times. one time i couldn't take a walk (or do any form of exercise for a year) due to a problem with the tendons/ligaments that attach at the trochanter. that's when my HDLs and triglycerides got so so bad. and now why i'm extra cautious to not do anything that would jeopardize being able to at least walk, though as you know, we don't always have control over that fate, sometimes we just wake up with a new body part out of commission.

Yeah.... sometimes you're d*mned if you do, and d*mned if you dont....
Also, it never ceases to amaze me how finely tuned things can be.

My dad has heart disease, so keeping cholesterol in check, good and bad, is a big topic of discussion in my family. My mom would not be happy if she knew my average intake of eggs per day. My dad's heart doctor tells him to keep it to one or less per day, but at one time he was only allowed egg white product, ugh. Finally found my numbers from 2 years ago - total 191, but i was flagged for LDL - 123; hdl - 56 and tri-59 so doc said nothing to worry about. But, as said, gotta pick your battle and arthritis and the nsd is my current one - just hoping it won't stir up another demon.
If I understand correctly, Sue - you say excercise won't lower your LDL's (I struggle with the excercise thing, I ache alot when i'm excercising, more tendon stuff, but i also do when i'm not - more stiffness and back pain), is this number a diet and heredity thing? And then the whole thread that statins may help AS got me thinking.

Yes. Kolorex Horipito. That is the product. Mine is supposedly some practitioner formulation (per labeling on the bottle). I don't know how that differs from the other formulations. It might be mere marketing for all I know. It is a little bit on the pricey side, so I hope it is doing some good. Like I said it isn't hurting anything.

went searching for some short info to sum it up and here's one. again, it mentions exercise for increasing HDLs, reducing triglycerides and blood pressure but says nothing about LDLs. however, niacin can raise HDLs and lower LDLs, but it can also raise blood sugar so they recommend to use it with caution. also mentions that plant sterols and soluble plant fibers can lower LDLs (oats, nuts, flax, psyllium (and i think all but the oats are ok on a NSD, correct me if i'm wrong). however if you can tolerate the statins (i couldn't), your idea is a good one to consider, it just might knock down the LDLs and reduce the arthritis symptoms at the same time, worth a consideration. one caution on the statins though, when i took it for a month, it worked very well at lowering my LDLs and triglycerides, made them low normal, and that was on a dose 1/2 of the lowest amount my GP said would work (though i tried to tell him i'm a very strong responder to drugs in general), however it also lowered my already low HDLs from 41 to 39, and that was with me walking every day which should have been helping to raise them. since i've been off the statin, my HDLs have gone up to 58, triglycerides are good. now that i've reread something about cholesterol in general, think i'm going to increase my intake of those soluble fibers and see what i can do to the LDLs. thanks for motivating me to go reread!

Lowering LDL Cholesterol Without Drugs

thanks!

http://www.cholesterol-and-health.com/

Animal fat is good, not bad!

i read through your link and don't see any references to back up the claims (maybe i just missed them?), so now i am curious about clinical / epidemiology studies to back up the claims.

i have seen literature from studies saying that statins may or may not be a good thing, that the omega 6 plant oils are not so great for us after all, and that yes, refined starches play just as much havoc on our cholesterol profile as anything else.

however, i have never read about any studies showing that animal fats are actually good for us. can you point me to that literature?

however,

the results of the framington study:

http://www.forces.org/articles/files/fram.htm

"Thanks to Framingham, Americans have come to understand that how they live often determines when they'll die. After 50 years, 1,000 research papers, and $43 million, the Framingham Heart Study has shown that... high cholesterol leads to heart disease. ....and that eating too much saturated fat affects cholesterol....."

more recently, i've read about "blue zones" and just last night was watching a TED seminar by the author of this book summarizing what was found in these studies:
the book:
http://www.amazon.com/Blue-Zones-Lessons-Living-Longest/dp/1426202741
the seminar: http://www.ted.com/talks/dan_buettner_how_to_live_to_be_100.html

one of the unifying themes was that eating a plant based diet correlated with longevity largely devoid of chronic illness including diabetes, heart disease, etc. there were other unifying themes as well, but the plant based diet was definitely one of the big ones.

if you have links to studies / papers, i'd be really interested in seeing them. always interested in learning new things. especially if it goes against everything i've learned up to that point.

thanks,

Hi Sue
Is saturated fat bad for the heart?
It is simple carbohydrates like sugar and refined white flour that cause worse outcomes.

http://www.ajcn.org/cgi/content/abstract/91/3/535?etoc

Cheers David

interesting, thanks........