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Should I expect my cholesterol to improve?

PaulinaB

PaulinaB

Well-Known Member
Messages
594
Location
London, UK
Type of diabetes
Type 1
Treatment type
Insulin
Hi everyone

I've been on LCHF for quite some time now, experimenting a lot and I'm loving it. I'm feeling great, my BG is stable, my weight is stable, all perfect. Before I started LCHF my bad cholesterol was raised and it still is. Should I be expecting it to improve on LCHF? I was doing a lot of experiments, testing how much carbs I can eat without breaking my ketosis, how quickly I can get back into ketosis, etc, so I'm kind of assuming this does not have a good effect on my cholesterol :) but if I go back to "hard core" low carb, should my cholesterol improve? I don't really mind it as it is (I feel fine) but my doctors are giving me grief so I wanted to show them I can improve it on my own.

If anyone had their cholesterol go either way in LCHF, please share!
 
PaulinaB said:
Hi everyone

I've been on LCHF for quite some time now, experimenting a lot and I'm loving it. I'm feeling great, my BG is stable, my weight is stable, all perfect. Before I started LCHF my bad cholesterol was raised and it still is. Should I be expecting it to improve on LCHF? I was doing a lot of experiments, testing how much carbs I can eat without breaking my ketosis, how quickly I can get back into ketosis, etc, so I'm kind of assuming this does not have a good effect on my cholesterol :) but if I go back to "hard core" low carb, should my cholesterol improve? I don't really mind it as it is (I feel fine) but my doctors are giving me grief so I wanted to show them I can improve it on my own.

If anyone had their cholesterol go either way in LCHF, please share!
Click to expand...

My totals have moved slightly, in each direction, whilst reduced carbing, but the telling factors are the components, which have almost universally improved, for me at least.

What in particular has happened to your triglycerides?
 
I know they have been changing a bit but I didn't really care about them too much so I'm not sure which way they went. I think they improved initially and then worsened when I started experimenting with carbs... I guess I'll go stop my experiments after Christmas and should see them improve again.
I think my cholesterol was always a bit off but I never bothered with it. It's only recently that my GP started talking about statins that made me think I should get them in order... :)

It's good to hear it improves for other people, so I can hope it will be the same for me.
 
I took a fish oil supplement to raise my good cholesterol, then the HDL/LDL ratio improved even if the bad cholesterol didn't. Eventually the bad cholesterol improved too. I read a link the other day that said in women the higher the cholesterol the better, sorry I can't find it now.
 
Hi @PaulinaB.

My Total Cholesterol was 7 prior to LCHF. After going on LCHF, it fluctuates between 9-10.

Triglycerides & HDL are good.
Every other "health" marker has dramatically improved. My last HBA1C was 5.4. My NAFLD is gone.
I have lost 6 and a half stone. BP & Heart Rate have returned to late teen levels. :) not needed any meds for this.
point is...i will never leave LCHF. Truly wish I had discovered this 30 years ago.

The merits of cholesterol as an useful predictor for CVD would yield an unending discussion.

Prior to LCHF, my CRP levels were off the charts & in to the next room.
I suspect it was due to chronic, systemic inflammation as a result of decades of rampant, uncontrolled hyperglycemia.
This may be why my liver is producing too much LDL.

After giving LCHF a year to correct this "possible" imbalance (i say "possible" because I am not entirely convinced it is a major problem), it has "failed".

Hence, I intend to intervene with a certain herb that has shown be improve TC/LDL hopefully to about 6.
I will not take statins.

You really need to evaluate the whole picture and decide for yourself.

All The Best.
Mo

p/s the only other thing i have not tried is exercise as i was trying to prove that exercise is BAD for weight loss in the obese.

pp/s i read somewhere that 3 out of 10 people who go on LCHF raise their cholesterol. Whether this is necessarily a bad thing is the question, i suppose.
 
msmi1970 said:
Hi @PaulinaB.

My Total Cholesterol was 7 prior to LCHF. After going on LCHF, it fluctuates between 9-10.

Triglycerides & HDL are good.
Every other "health" marker has dramatically improved. My last HBA1C was 5.4. My NAFLD is gone.
I have lost 6 and a half stone. BP & Heart Rate have returned to late teen levels. :) not needed any meds for this.
point is...i will never leave LCHF. Truly wish I had discovered this 30 years ago.

The merits of cholesterol as an useful predictor for CVD would yield an unending discussion.

Prior to LCHF, my CRP levels were off the charts & in to the next room.
I suspect it was due to chronic, systemic inflammation as a result of decades of rampant, uncontrolled hyperglycemia.
This may be why my liver is producing too much LDL.

After giving LCHF a year to correct this "possible" imbalance (i say "possible" because I am not entirely convinced it is a major problem), it has "failed".

Hence, I intend to intervene with a certain herb that has shown be improve TC/LDL hopefully to about 6.
I will not take statins.

You really need to evaluate the whole picture and decide for yourself.

All The Best.
Mo

p/s the only other thing i have not tried is exercise as i was trying to prove that exercise is BAD for weight loss in the obese.

pp/s i read somewhere that 3 out of 10 people who go on LCHF raise their cholesterol. Whether this is necessarily a bad thing is the question, i suppose.
Click to expand...


There is a school of thought that believes if your trigs are good, the LDL is more likely to be "big and fluffy" which isn't believed to be harmful. Professor Sikaris has made a couple of excellent presentations on the subject:


and


I'm about to have another of those "special little chats" with a GP at my practise, following a panel of bloods for my Crumblies Health Check earlier this month. I have introduced on of his colleagues to Prof Sikaris (via YouTube) and other reading, and I feel I will want to do the same for this on.

I started a thread a while ago talking about lipids (probably about a year ago now), and I must find it and read it again before my "little chat" on Tuesday. I'm significantly unconvinced about statins for women in particular.
 
PaulinaB said:
Hi everyone

I've been on LCHF for quite some time now, experimenting a lot and I'm loving it. I'm feeling great, my BG is stable, my weight is stable, all perfect. Before I started LCHF my bad cholesterol was raised and it still is. Should I be expecting it to improve on LCHF? I was doing a lot of experiments, testing how much carbs I can eat without breaking my ketosis, how quickly I can get back into ketosis, etc, so I'm kind of assuming this does not have a good effect on my cholesterol :) but if I go back to "hard core" low carb, should my cholesterol improve? I don't really mind it as it is (I feel fine) but my doctors are giving me grief so I wanted to show them I can improve it on my own.

If anyone had their cholesterol go either way in LCHF, please share!
Click to expand...

My total chol has risen a fraction since going ketogenic. It was 5.2 and is now 5.4 (5.2 is the number linked to minimum all-cause-mortality)
BUT (and it is a huge BUT) the change is because my HDL (the healthy one) has risen significantly :D (I take krill oil, eat oily fish, and try and have a couple of avocados a week), my Trigs have fallen :D (they were never high, but now they are half what the NHS considers to be low enough for health), and my LDL has fallen :D.

It will be a very interesting conversation if anyone starts pushing statins on me.

As the others have said, it is ALL in the breakdown.

I think, in certain circumstances, statins are useful. For me, 99% of women, esp older women, and anyone over 70 yrs whether male or female, I think they are a BAD idea. They are also a bad idea if the dose it too high (some of them linger in the body for days before breaking down, creating a cumulative effect which increases the dose significantly). And any statin should be accompanied by Q10 supplementation, to avoid some of the common side effects of aches and pains in the muscles.

There is so much new info out there on cholesterol and statins, that I think everyone should do their own reading, make up their own mind, and reject any advice given to them by internet forumites or health care professionals, unless that advice is based on the latest, most informed evidence.

Those videos of Sikaris posted by @AndBreathe above, are up to date, well researched and well evidenced. The man is a leader in his field.
 
Appreciate your feedback @AndBreathe. Have indeed watched/read Dr.Sikaris as well as Tom Dayspring, Chris Masterjohn, Chris Kresser, Ivor Cummins and others on this subject.

There is much debate on the role of cholesterol as a potential marker for CVD which in my opinion is precisely why it really is an n=1 issue because everyone seems to react to a significantly different degree.

Granted, the TC/HDL ratio is quite far down the list..but it is there nevertheless..
(and why I let it be for 12 months imagining those big, buoyant LDL particles gaily swimming in my bloodstream :) until I discovered that micron levels distinguish the various LDL)...
Also it may be my paranoia but I do somewhat see the purported correlation between LDL & CVD in those Framingham graphs.

Hence, from my personal standpoint, coupled with such high CRP readings, chronic TC of close to 400 needs to be addressed at some stage without statins, of course.
 
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