Managing high cholesterol and T2D...how?

you may need to do some reading, your triglyceride levels are from carbs, not LCHF, which will raisr the 'good' HDL and lower the TG/triglycerides


www.youtube.com/watch?v=n8BY4fyLvZc

Quite a long post so please bear with me...

GOOD question MM. I have been T2 for 15 years. Last week, I suffered a minor-stroke BUT thankfully no permanent damage. My blood tests revealed my Total ChoL at 10.4 with LDL at 8.0.

Since starting LCHF, I monitor my blood every 2 months and had noticed that both LDL/total ChoL were steadily rising. However, having done extensive reading & watched Volek, Sikaris et al, I was prepared to persist as LCHF has brought my sugars down to non-diabetic levels & I have lost 65 lbs.

My issue is that my HDL levels were also slowly declining & Triglycerides were slowly climbing. In fact, both HDL & TG were much better prior to LCHF. Doctors have started me on statins, which I agreed to, NOT for the cholesterol BUT to stabilize further possible plaque ruptures that may lead to another stroke.

Conventional wisdom is that diet contributes less than 20% to your blood cholesterol levels. During LCHF, I consume between 3-6 eggs & around 5 tablespoons of butter per day so that could be part of what is causing the rise. Consequently, I have reduced eggs & butter drastically whilst introducing Olive Oil/avocados into my diet.

http://www.wheatbellyblog.com/2012/06/i-lost-weight-and-my-cholesterol-went-up/
This link was posted on the Forum recently and it is something I also read in Phinney/Volek's book. The theory is that substantial weight loss over a short period of time releases a considerable amount of ChoL & Fat into the bloodstream leading to higher levels and in the short term causes HDL to drop whilst struggling to deal with the excess Chol/Fat lipoproteins/particles.

My point is, for me a morbidly obese person with long term diabetes and strong family history of that & heart disease with some hypertension thrown in for good measure, it can be overwhelming to deal with all these problems at once. The thing is my secondary Cardiologist whom I have known for about 20 years is astounded by the reduction in weight & blood sugar control (& ironically a non-LCHF believer) is actually encouraging me to stick with it and that is key. For my part, I am dealing with the ChoL as a secondary issue to be managed by diet & statins IF necessary.

I would encourage, if possible, for you to have scans; heart and possibly carotid (neck) to identify possible plaque build-up which can nowadays be arrested and possibly even reversed with good diet/medication.

Hope that helps.
All The Best,
Mo

Zoe Harcombe has written a recent blogpost with many references on this topic:
http://www.zoeharcombe.com/2015/03/worried-about-cholesterol-andor-statins/

memememeiii said:

I have been diagnosed with even higher cholesterol than ever - 6.5. Trying to determine how to have a high fat low carb diet and NOT cause an incident or damage to my already VERY HIGH as they say CHOLESTEROL - I could do with some thoughts from this forum.

How does one do high fat and low cholesterol? How to do saturated fatty foods - ie. meats - and reduce cholesterol?

This isn't something I can dismiss...my grandmother died of a stroke, my grandfather did, too, and my mother before age 70 had a stroke. It runs in my family, as did and does diabetes. How to manage both of these conditions...ideas?

Thank you,
MM.

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There's a gp (Southport GP) on the forum who has had considerable success with his type 2 patients by them following a low-carb diet but eating fats in moderation, this resulted in improved cholesterol levels so there's no need to go down the high-fat route unless you want to of course, here is the article that he posted on the forum last year which includes his dietary advice:

http://www.practicaldiabetes.com/Sp.../March 2014/PP Unwin final proofs revised.pdf

noblehead said:

There's a gp (Southport GP) on the forum who has had considerable success with his type 2 patients by them following a low-carb diet but eating fats in moderation, this resulted in improved cholesterol levels so there's no need to go down the high-fat route unless you want to of course, here is the article that he posted on the forum last year which includes his dietary advice:

http://www.practicaldiabetes.com/SpringboardWebApp/userfiles/espdi/file/March 2014/PP Unwin final proofs revised.pdf

Click to expand...

I consider myself to be on the low carb high fat lifestyle but the high fat label is a bit misleading.
I honestly don't think of it as high fat more old fashioned normal levels of fat as opposed this modern rubbish of fats are bad bad bad you must have semi skimmed skimmed low fat no fat thinking.
All these low fat products are industrial even scientific products and not simple normal food products as nature intended and which served us well the last few thousand years.

I remember dripping butties covered with salt!
No mum no house wife would chuck such a product away when I was a kid!

JACKTHELAD said:

I consider myself to be on the low carb high fat lifestyle but the high fat label is a bit misleading.
I honestly don't think of it as high fat more old fashioned normal levels of fat as opposed this modern rubbish of fats are bad bad bad you must have semi skimmed skimmed low fat no fat thinking.
All these low fat products are industrial even scientific products and not simple normal food products as nature intended and which served us well the last few thousand years.

Click to expand...

Yes I think a lot of low-carbers just follow a similar diet to what Southport GP advises and don't eat low-fat products, the high-fat aspect can be very misleading IMHO.

I tend to lowish carb as I can still eat some carbs such as bread, cereals and potatoes and eat full fat as opposed to high fat. I no longer have low fat spreads, yoghurts etc but instead have butter, cheese, eggs, full fat greek yoghurts, olive oil etc.

noblehead said:

Yes I think a lot of low-carbers just follow a similar diet to what Southport GP advises and don't eat low-fat products, the high-fat aspect can be very misleading IMHO.

Click to expand...

if you look at his sources, there are LCHF ones, this has been discussed before, the name is the name, low carb high fat, but the high fat part has a large variable, depending if you want to lose or maintain your weight.

http://www.practicaldiabetes.com/Sp.../March 2014/PP Unwin final proofs revised.pdf

This has been a really informative thread for me thanks. Q. Some foods I thought were natural and good and low on the GI index such a quinoa , I have used to replace the rice and potatoes, but reading the labels again, some are high with omega 3, fibre, protein, but also high carbs ( although the sugar is nil), should I look to drop these foods as well?

My cholesterol was 6.5 and now down to 5.4 but the video explaining Triglycerides has given me a whole new perspective and once again demonstrates the benefits of the forum.

Coming in from school and grabbing the thickest white bread crust I could find from the sunblest loaf and spreading 1/2 an inch of marg on top, just to keep going until teatime, with chips cooked in Lard arhhh, why do I have diabetes again?