High Triglycerides on Ketotic Diet?
petr8888
Posts: 47 Member
So I went to my doctor to get a sense of my cholesterol situation. So my HDL and LDL are both up from prior. She is concerned about LDL and sending for more tests and she is suggesting possible statins which I will resist.
The surprise is triglycerides - I think she said 2.34 (dont know what that means).
Thoughts????
The surprise is triglycerides - I think she said 2.34 (dont know what that means).
Thoughts????
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Replies
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That's high - ideal is in the 1.0 -1.7 range. Above 2 needs attention usually, as the heart attack / stroke risk increases.
Losing weight & reducing calories can help lower triglycerides. Also increasing healthy fats & decreasing unhealthy fats is important. Low carb eating is beneficial. Exercise is beneficial.0 -
Make sure they test your full panel of thyroid stuff, too. High trigs are a HUGE sign of your thyroid needing attention. My trigs cut almost in half in a few months of getting on thyroid meds and cut further with going keto, so I'm inclined to think your thyroid needs attention, even if it doesn't show on the standard tests.
www.stopthethyroidmadness.com
If you are actively losing weight, that LDL number is useless. If your ratio between HDL and trigs is improving, disregard total and LDL. I'm currently waiting on my library to get the book "Cholesterol Clarity" so I can explain more scientifically.0 -
Before and after numbers would be good to see. And you did fast before the blood test, right?
How much weight have you lost? Was your liver function tested? Do you drink alcohol? Taking any steroids?
There are lots of factors, but one of the sources of triglycerides is from de novo lipogenesis -- the conversion of carbs to fat. That's the source that consistently goes down with a low-carb diet.0 -
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My lipid panel improved (even HDL increased by 7 points) after approximately 6 months in to this woe. Though I don't really trust the numbers from a diagnostic standpoint. We have those with perfectly normal lipid panels going for coronary bypass surgeries and those with elevations in their numbers who never have any negative cardiac events. Once again, N=1.0
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If you read the book, "Cholesterol Clarity", you will learn that during the pendency of a Keto diet that your lipids will look bad at first. Then after you lose the weight and settle down (after 6 months at goal weight) you will have great lipid numbers ~ without the use of medicine.
Secondly, and more importantly: Your doc is probably not up to speed on Statins. I guarantee if you were to read the above mentioned book, you WOULD NOT go on statins! They are a HORRIBLE-for-your-health drug. The side effects are worse than the cure. And it doesn't cure anything, but eating low carb will.
I beg you to NOT go on statins. Change your doctor! Even if you don't read the book, at least google it...
I hope this helps,
Dan the Man from Michigan
Keto / The Recipe Water Fasting / E.A.S.Y. Exercise Program
Current weight: 194.9, 119 pounds down, 16 to go. 13.75 months on diet
It's Ketogenic or Bariatric Surgery! How I Found the Ketogenic Diet
Previous Discussions on the LCD & Keto Groups
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KnitOrMiss wrote: »Make sure they test your full panel of thyroid stuff, too. High trigs are a HUGE sign of your thyroid needing attention. My trigs cut almost in half in a few months of getting on thyroid meds and cut further with going keto, so I'm inclined to think your thyroid needs attention, even if it doesn't show on the standard tests.
www.stopthethyroidmadness.com
If you are actively losing weight, that LDL number is useless. If your ratio between HDL and trigs is improving, disregard total and LDL. I'm currently waiting on my library to get the book "Cholesterol Clarity" so I can explain more scientifically.
VERY INTERESSTING - she flagged that thyroid is showing hypo / reduced action. Sshe sent me for a whack of thyroid tests to assess this. What is the link between hypo thyroid and high triglycerides.
This is very upsetting as have lost a lot of weight and now seem to havebad blood work...0 -
That's high - ideal is in the 1.0 -1.7 range. Above 2 needs attention usually, as the heart attack / stroke risk increases.
Losing weight & reducing calories can help lower triglycerides. Also increasing healthy fats & decreasing unhealthy fats is important. Low carb eating is beneficial. Exercise is beneficial.
Thanks - I have lost a lot of weight so ketosis seems to be working. The high tri glycerdes a big surprise. May be tied to thyroid issues.0 -
Thanks to all of you. Between your posts and some research it appears to be thyroid. I did not originally mention it as did not know connection. But the panel showed low thyroid which she is running more tests on. Low thyroid leads to high trigs - not clear yet why.
So need to figure out how to deal with thyroid to get trig down. Looks like to get thyroid fixed you need to reduce fat consumption - which is great for my ketotic diet!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!0 -
So I went to my doctor to get a sense of my cholesterol situation. So my HDL and LDL are both up from prior. She is concerned about LDL and sending for more tests and she is suggesting possible statins which I will resist.
The surprise is triglycerides - I think she said 2.34 (dont know what that means).
Thoughts????
@petr8888 While my triglycerides and HDL both moved into the green zone from the red zone my LDL when deeper into the red zone after having been off all grains and most all sugars for 9 months.
At the age of 64 I do understand I need to focus on my numbers yet I know when moving to eat LCHF the numbers can go crazy for a while. I know my liver and other organs have been stressed out for years it it may take years for they to recover as much as possible.
On a LCHF way of eating I think it is best to just stay the course and give our bodies 2-3 years to sort things out as our cells get replaced at least in our organs. My focus in on improving my health at the cellular level because that is the foundation to regaining health at the organ level.
It is going to take years of eating correctly for me to recover from 30+ years of eating wrong. No I will never fully overcome the years of bad eating but I will work for improving health even at my age year by year.
Keep your eye on your numbers and your diet and give yourself some time while the body sorts things out. I expect that while take me 3-5 years in my case working at if full time.0 -
My mother was diagnosed with hypothyroid and high trigs at the same time. She was put on meds for both. After a few months, her trigs came down to normal levels & she was able to stop cholesterol meds. It seemed the low thyroid caused the trig issue. She didn't make any other dietary changes, or exercise changes. Trigs have never been a problem again.
As for thyroid, I don't believe it is Keto related. There's a huge genetic component to thyroid issues (my husbands family, despite being very healthy) & it's also caused by many auto immune diseases (in my mothers case).
Wishing you continued health & success on your journey!0 -
I don't know what to make of my high triglycerides. One doctor thinks they're great because of my high HDL. Another doctor thinks the total is too high regardless. I don't remember the exact numbers; they're at the low end of high. I already exercise, and always have. I haven't checked again since I started being vigilant about low carb.
Plus, both doctors got laid off by the office they work for, which sucks because I liked them both very much, so now I have to find a new doctor, but at least that will be a third opinion.0 -
Too many carbs.0
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Thanks again to all. I have lost a whack of weight - over 20 pounds using ketosis. I understand that beyong weight loss ketosis provides other benefits - ie cancer avoidance etc.
The recent issue re high TGL seems to be thyroid related but waiting for the blood tests. In the mean time I am seeking to increase both iodine and selenium levels to help with with thyroid. I am unclear re what has happened here - has ketosis triggered thyroid issues as an example. Historically she has never raise ahigh TGL level to me = could just be co-incidence.0 -
Little Zebra - I feel your pain. Seems like you are in the same place as me. Doing low carb é high fat re ketosis for good objectives and wind up with apparently negative results - ie high TGL. It has ceratainly come to me as a negative surprise. I am hopeful that the thyroid issue is not driven by the diet - I am boosting iodine and selenium to support thyroid. Disturbingly - some sites seem to imply that to assist thyroid U should reduce fat consumption - not so good for a ketotic diet. Signed - Dazed and Confused
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NDVOICE - Thanks re your thoughts - all very disturbing to me. Seems like I need to wait for the blood tests to find out what is driving the thyroid issue, Whether this isdrriven be ketosis diet, auto immune et0
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Gale Thanks - I get it re LT effects - I was expecting all positive re blood tests. this is negative big time. My mother dies of heart attack and stroke so this is bad news. I want to figure out rapidly if ketosis has unintentionlly walked me into a bad scenario re TGL and thyroid.0
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I doubt the thyroid issue was caused by ketosis but I do think a change like ketosis can make an autoimmune issue flare-up.... At least this s true in my experience. I have a few autoimmune issues, with Hashimoto's being one of them. In my first month of ketosis I had a flare-up of symptoms but it settled down fairly quickly. Perhaps that is your case?
As far as I know, ketosis will not cause hypothyroidism or autoimmune diseases. The doctor I was seeing to treat my thyroid was advising me to try Atkins for a year before I finally switched.
I am afraid I can't comment of the triglycerides. Even though I have hypothyroidism, I am also a celiac and we tend to have low triglycerides due to fat malabsorption. I am in the opposite boat of hoping my triglycerides have finally come up a bit.
Good luck.
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KnitOrMiss wrote: »Make sure they test your full panel of thyroid stuff, too. High trigs are a HUGE sign of your thyroid needing attention. My trigs cut almost in half in a few months of getting on thyroid meds and cut further with going keto, so I'm inclined to think your thyroid needs attention, even if it doesn't show on the standard tests.
www.stopthethyroidmadness.com
If you are actively losing weight, that LDL number is useless. If your ratio between HDL and trigs is improving, disregard total and LDL. I'm currently waiting on my library to get the book "Cholesterol Clarity" so I can explain more scientifically.
Here is one section in "Cholesterol Clarity" (by J. Moore & Eric Westman) that talks about this:
ch. 14: Nine Reasons Why Cholesterol Levels Can Go Up
1. Hypothyroidism
Overweight people often talk about having a “messed-up thyroid.” The thyroid is responsible for so many bodily functions, including cholesterol levels in the blood, so it’s an easy scapegoat. When thyroid function is low (aka hypothyroidism), cholesterol tends to increase. What’s going on with the thyroid when this happens?
The thyroid hormone known as T3 tells the LDL receptors in your body to get rid of the excess LDL in the blood by pushing it into the cells, where it is used for a variety of purposes. Unfortunately, when your T3 levels are low, this process slows down, leaving LDL cholesterol floating aimlessly through your bloodstream.
I spoke with Paul Jaminet, author of The Perfect Health Diet and one of this book’s experts, about this to gain further insight into what is happening. He advises getting a full thyroid panel for anyone with high cholesterol. But he also warns that the standard ranges on most lab reports are not very reliable. Here are two excellent books on thyroid health: Datis Kharrazian’s Why Do I Still Have Thyroid Symptoms When My Lab Tests Are Normal? (ThyroidBook.com) and Janie Bowthorpe’s Stop the Thyroid Madness: A Patient Revolution against Decades of Inferior Thyroid Treatment (StopTheThyroidMadness.com). I’ve interviewed both of these authors on The Livin’ La Vida Low-Carb Show podcast in episodes 382 and 383.
Sometimes hypothyroidism doesn’t manifest itself until you make changes in your diet. So if your cholesterol suddenly skyrockets after beginning a low-carb, high-fat or Paleo diet, get your full thyroid panel checked. In addition, make sure you are getting adequate amounts of iodine (found primarily in seaweed and kelp).
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@camtosh
Very helpful thank you0 -
I doubt the thyroid issue was caused by ketosis but I do think a change like ketosis can make an autoimmune issue flare-up.... At least this s true in my experience. I have a few autoimmune issues, with Hashimoto's being one of them.
I've been doing research on this relationship, since I was simultaneously diagnosed with Hashimoto's and diabetes. The research is mixed about the compatibility between a ketogenic diet and Haashimoto's. (I haven't seen anything suggesting it causes itFor now I've decided to just see what the ketogenic diet does - since it is clearly good for diabetes, and continue my research.
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Little Zebra - I feel your pain. Seems like you are in the same place as me. Doing low carb é high fat re ketosis for good objectives and wind up with apparently negative results - ie high TGL. It has ceratainly come to me as a negative surprise. I am hopeful that the thyroid issue is not driven by the diet - I am boosting iodine and selenium to support thyroid. Disturbingly - some sites seem to imply that to assist thyroid U should reduce fat consumption - not so good for a ketotic diet. Signed - Dazed and Confused
Re. the thyroid, I can only speak anecdotally: my thyroid took a dive in my early 20s, back in the days of low fat dieting, when I went on a low fat diet. It hasn't gotten better, but in all my years of eating a lot more fat than I did back then, my need for thyroid replacement hormone has not increased, and I've also lost weight while finding it easier to moderate my eating habits. (Not coincidentally, I started eating more fat after I got thyroid medication at about age 29, and suddenly had energy for cooking meals instead of eating whole grain toast for three meals a day).
Various related thoughts....Did you have an anti-thyroid antibody test? I've read some scientific papers that suggest that a ketogenic diet may be beneficial for inflammation, especially for nervous system inflammation, and for other autoimmune disorders such as multiple sclerosis and rheumatoid arthritis.0 -
NDVOICE - Thanks re your thoughts - all very disturbing to me. Seems like I need to wait for the blood tests to find out what is driving the thyroid issue, Whether this isdrriven be ketosis diet, auto immune et
Yes, don't panic yet. It may all be very manageable once you have answers. The waiting is the hardest part!
And on a side note - this diet is recommended for auto-immune issues. (Big reason why I'm on it!) I'm "white food" and dairy free due to disabling autoimmune disease. A year ago, I fell frequently, walked with a cane & had searing nerve pain all over my body. The disease also attacked my eyes, my blood pressure. I had fevers & swelling several days per week, constant stomach issues too. it was a nightmare. Since starting this diet, it all calmed down & I am able to do more than I EVER thought was possible. However, I do take iodine daily due to my moms history & get my thyroid checked regularly. If my trigs suddenly went high (like my moms) I would be pretty certain my thyroid was being wonky. I have the heridity, plus with autoimmune - you never know what your body is going to do next lol.
Please let me know how it goes! I hope you get answers quick & docs help you get everything under control. Just think, you may be feeling even better soon! More energy is always a good thing!!
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Holy crap, @ndvoice , I hope that your illness stays quelled.0
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lithezebra wrote: »Holy crap, @ndvoice , I hope that your illness stays quelled.
Thanks! Me too! I'm not going down without a fight lol. This year - 3 rounds of physical therapy, 3 surgeries & no answers (from the medical community) on how to stop this disease from attacking my body. I'm battling it with a ketosis diet! I'm doing hard core workouts in the gym now - just over the past month. My in laws came to visit & they hadn't seen my more recent improvements. They could not BELIEVE how I could move now. My blood work still shows wacky stuff, but inflammatory markers are much lower.
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Thanks to all of you. Between your posts and some research it appears to be thyroid. I did not originally mention it as did not know connection. But the panel showed low thyroid which she is running more tests on. Low thyroid leads to high trigs - not clear yet why.
So need to figure out how to deal with thyroid to get trig down. Looks like to get thyroid fixed you need to reduce fat consumption - which is great for my ketotic diet!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I'm still catching up on all the responses, but I don't know who gave you this information. My endocrinologist PUT ME on a low carb/ketogenic diet to HELP with my thyroid issues... Getting on thyroid meds dropped my trigs by over 100 points in just a few months... You need an endocrinologist, if you are just talking to your regular doctor. My PCP gave advice almost directly contradicting what my Endocrinologist later adjusted and properly treated my hypothyroidism.0 -
Thanks again to all. I have lost a whack of weight - over 20 pounds using ketosis. I understand that beyong weight loss ketosis provides other benefits - ie cancer avoidance etc.
The recent issue re high TGL seems to be thyroid related but waiting for the blood tests. In the mean time I am seeking to increase both iodine and selenium levels to help with with thyroid. I am unclear re what has happened here - has ketosis triggered thyroid issues as an example. Historically she has never raise ahigh TGL level to me = could just be co-incidence.
Ketosis is very very unlikely to TRIGGER anything. A friend of mine made a great analysis thought. We've been driving our little beater cars (our bodies) heavy and hard, without much maintenance, getting it covered in mud (fats) with lots of dents and dings for all the years we've abused ourselves with poor diet, untreated medical conditions, and lack of exercise (the equivalent of oil changes and tune ups, etc.).
That being said, when we finally start restoring our health, we wash off that mud (lose some weight), and start uncovering all the dents and dings (damage) that have been done while we were sidetracked by the mud's issues, etc. Most folks who have hypothyroidism often do not have the tests show problems until years after issues have begun. If my PCP had not been diligent in saying that all my symptoms pointed to hypothyroidism, and noticed when I had a large shift in my test results, even though I was still technically in the range of "normal," I would have never started treatment and started working to figure things out quickly.
Something I learned recently, too, is that apparently edema, particularly in the legs when previous swelling has not been present can be a huge sign of under-performing thyroid function. I mentioned the swelling, and she said it was good that my endo had upped my dosage, as that is a far stronger indicator of hypothyroidism than of heart function... I'd had no idea, but will now be paying more attention as I adjust to my newer dosage of my medication...
I have often said in the last 5 or so years that it seems just as soon as I get one issue addressed, it seems as though I uncover 2 more that were hidden by other issues. So in many ways, I'm thankful for the smaller things that have lead me to uncover and address bigger things before they've become too damaging - for example, it was mostly my thyroid issue that lead me to get diagnosed properly as insulin resistant, which lead me to finally try this WOE/WOL and start making some overall positive changes in my health.
Luckily, most of our damage can be repaired, treated, and healed in some ways!!!0
