Cholesterol & Potassium

Misiaxcore

I don't know too much about them and how they affect the body/weight loss.

My mom is always getting on my case about eating eggs everyday because of the "cholesterol," but I think she's wrong lol.

Google hasn't really helped me in regards to understanding cholesterol found in food and what potassium is really for (though I think I have a general idea :ohwell:) :laugh:

Can anyone explain them a little better ?

acciomuscles

bump!

mahidac

cholesterol -

as far as eggs go the yolk in an egg has something like 85% of your daily allowance of cholesterol so yeah I love eggs too so I had to cut them out (I use egg beaters now, which are basically just whites but are a bit high in sodium). Cholesterol gets dangerous when its packaged as LDL in your body - LDL itself isnt dangers but its oxidized form is what causes plaques etc. in your system. Cholesterol is kind of a person to person thing because there is such a genetic link - and because it can be relatively maintained through statins and high HDL

Potassium -

One of the main ions in our body as far as countercurrent exchange and really powering so many different process that occur in your body. As far as physiology potassium helps regulate the amount of sodium in your body and the acidity of your blood - Aldosterone helps us store sodium at the cost of secreting potassium and vice versa, it also help us shunt Hydrogen when we need to either raise or lower our pH. Getting to the point where you actually need to actively monitor your potassium usually only occurs in people who are on diuretics for kidney/CHF issues - since most of them are potassium wasting.

High potassium can cause you to retain water because in an effort to shunt out potassium your body will acidify your blood and produce aldosterone which will retain sodium and water (but your body also has ADH/Vasopressin to help prevent this or we would all have edema).

fudgebudget

Eggs have gotten a bad rap for their cholesterol, but recent studies have actually shown that they can help lower your cholesterol. The World's Healthiest Foods site does a pretty good job of interpreting studies into layman's terms and always cite their sources- here's their page on eggs: http://whfoods.org/genpage.php?tname=foodspice&dbid=92

Potassium helps maintain blood pressure and assists in muscle function. Bananas are a good source of potassium, and it's why people say to eat a banana before you go to bed if you wake up with muscle cramps.

Jorra

Potassium is important for driving many of the metabolic processes within your body. Sodium and potassium work together to create ion gradients to drive other substances in or out of cells. They also work together in neurons to propagate impulses.

My favorites high potassium foods are milk, potatoes, tomatoes, bananas, and oranges.