Help !, high cholesterol on LCHF

You need to analyse what is in your cholesterol before creating a plan !

if you also post all the related date - hdl, ldl, triglysiceride - people will have more of a clue .

Hello

My dad was diagnosed with type 2 about 6 years ago and had high levels of cholesterol

After many nights of reading up on what foods to eat and avoid we devised a food plan and testing food for sugar spikes

After 6 months on his new plan he went back to his GP his blood levels were down to 6.8 and his GP made a comment that his cholesterol levels were a lot lower

He puts the cholesterol lowering down to his diet but more importantly eating foods that are meant to help lower cholesterol

Like advocado ,walnuts ,white onion ,garlic,flaxseed ,oats

I quite like advocado walnuts and onion myself now

Tony

Warning - I am quite bigoted on this topic.

The normal NHS approach is to give you statins.
This brought my cholesterol down but the side effects were unacceptable.

There is a scool of thought which says that higher cholesterol may not be bad for you, especially as you get older.

At the moment I am running high cholesterol because my high fat diet seems to be controlling both my weight and my blood glucose.

You could cut down on saturated fats, you could take plant sterols, you could have your blood pressure checked and talk to your Doctor about risk levels.

Diabetics have a higher risk profile but at least some of this can be due to poor diet and poor blood glucose control.

Hildaandhoward said:

Diagnosed Type 2 in March 2016. BG 7.6
August 2016 lost 2.5 stone , BG 5.7. Cholesterol 4.7

Just returned from yearly review. BG 5.4 but Cholesterol now 7.6
What to do? Any advice gratefully received

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Hi
I guess we should also ask are we talking to Hilda or Howard?
Did you have an HbA1c? Are these the results of that test?
What are you eating?

Hi Hilda, I have exactly the same problem despite eating the recommended fat sources, exercising, losing weight etc. Am now going to try adding in 30g of milled flaxseed and some plant sterols per day and see if this helps. My blood pressure, which was an average 120/80 has decreased however. I am still mystified as to why this has happened despite some helpful suggestions from forum members.

Hello

I take it the fish you eat is low in salt and if tinned soup this is also low

I have just been in my supermarket to buy some salmon for my dad and the difference in salt levels for salmon was shocking

He also had high blood pressure when diagnosed with type 2 and since he stopped eating tinned mackerel daily which to his surprise was swimming in salt his blood pressure lowered

I suppose what I'm saying is have you checked lately what you are eating what's on the label

Salt content
Satturated fat level

I was surprised at the high salt content in some tinned soups as I was looking for foods for him to eat when he was first diagnosed in fact it was due to the high salt content some tinned soups that my mother started making home made chicken broth

Like I said in my previous post my dads cholesterol was high about 7.2 and he reduced it to 4.8

As he doesn't like taking medication he wanted to see if he could lower it by food alone

There was only a handful of foods that we found that claim to do this advocado,walnuts,onions garlic and flaxseed mabe more

But since he introduced those foods daily into his diet he lowered it to about 4.8
His GP was amazed by the lowering and did comment on how low it was compared to his last check

I know I sound like a old mother hen but don't underestimate the power of certain foods I realise it won't work for everyone

But if it's worth a try

Also how do you cook you fish / chicken unless you grill or boil
Different frying oils have different smoke points
Which means if the oil gets heated to that smoke point the oil will breakdown and become a bad oil (don't know the technical term)

Sea fish will be very high in salt compared to say farmed salmon or fresh water fish

He uses a refined 100% rapeseed oil which has a high smoke point of 220c

Just thought I would share what he has been through and found


Tony

If you are in a position exercise this will improve your hdl and lower triglycerides. Apparently it can take in some several months on LCHF to improve cholesterol numbers if this is important to you. It really is the triglycerides that need focus as this fat in the blood is dangerous.

I just happen to be listening to a podcast with several heavy weights of LCHF such as Volek, The Diet Doctor etc, of where they discuss this topic amongst other things. Try searching youtube for LLVLC-1161-medical-QA. If this does not find the discussion try Livin La Vida Low Carb.

Last October year my cholesterol was 5.2 and it dropped to 4.8 in Feb, but jumped to 6.2 in May. It was suggested that I take statins, but I told the diabetes nurse that I would never take them as they can be extremely dangerous. I have just bought some Plant Sterol supplements and will take them in the run up to the next test. I also will cut back on the double cream and eat some more foods which lower cholesterol.

I think the drop from 5.2 to 4.8 could have been because I was eating porridge several times a week. I was toying with the idea of doing some extended intermittent fasting and then seeing if this improved my carb tolerance so I could then try 20g of porridge without it spiking my blood too much. Previously I was eating 40+g of porridge and it was raising my blood sugars to over 10, two hours later.

One thing about Triglycerides.
As far as I know these carry fat from the gut to the liver for processing, so the levels depend on what you eat before the test.
Although you are told the test doesn’t have to be fasting, it is sensible to fast if you want a more reliable Triglycerides number.

Art Of Flowers said:

Last October year my cholesterol was 5.2 and it dropped to 4.8 in Feb, but jumped to 6.2 in May. It was suggested that I take statins, but I told the diabetes nurse that I would never take them as they can be extremely dangerous. I have just bought some Plant Sterol supplements and will take them in the run up to the next test. I also will cut back on the double cream and eat some more foods which lower cholesterol.

I think the drop from 5.2 to 4.8 could have been because I was eating porridge several times a week. I was toying with the idea of doing some extended intermittent fasting and then seeing if this improved my carb tolerance so I could then try 20g of porridge without it spiking my blood too much. Previously I was eating 40+g of porridge and it was raising my blood sugars to over 10, two hours later.

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From what I have read (and an old study I found) our cholesterol levels can and probably do vary throughout the day so diagnosing anything based on one test seems a bit crazy. A bit like diagnosing diabetes based on one finger prick test. None of us would accept that yet doctors are happy to prescribe drugs to artificially lower a vital substance in our blood based on a single reading.