Cholesterol Help

DietPrada
DietPrada Posts: 1,171 Member
Guys I need help. I switched to Keto 4 years ago after a pre-diabetic diagnosis. Diabetes killed my Dad. Today I'm 42yo, and have no signs of glucose issues. I've also lost 87lbs.

Last year I had blood tests and my cholesterol was 6.2. They put you on medication at 6.5. I asked them to wait, told them I was losing weight, it had never been an issue before, I was sure it would settle. Today, my cholesterol is 7.7 and my doctor is very concerned. Prior to Keto I never had any issues with my cholesterol.

The information he's given me goes against pretty much every aspect of Keto. Low fat everything. Lean meat. Plenty of grain, fruit and vegetables. If I eat this way I will get diabetes, guaranteed. If I don't, and continue eating the way I am (Keto) I'll end up having a heart attack, or at the very least on cholesterol medication. I have 3 months to lower my reading by diet before going back for more tests.

What the hell do I do? Seems I have to choose between heart attack from high cholesterol, or slow miserable decline in health and then heart attack from *kitten* diabetes.

I'm at a total loss.
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Replies

  • RalfLott
    RalfLott Posts: 5,036 Member
    edited April 2017
    Guys I need help. I switched to Keto 4 years ago after a pre-diabetic diagnosis. Diabetes killed my Dad. Today I'm 42yo, and have no signs of glucose issues. I've also lost 87lbs.

    Last year I had blood tests and my cholesterol was 6.2. They put you on medication at 6.5. I asked them to wait, told them I was losing weight, it had never been an issue before, I was sure it would settle. Today, my cholesterol is 7.7 and my doctor is very concerned. Prior to Keto I never had any issues with my cholesterol.

    The information he's given me goes against pretty much every aspect of Keto. Low fat everything. Lean meat. Plenty of grain, fruit and vegetables. If I eat this way I will get diabetes, guaranteed. If I don't, and continue eating the way I am (Keto) I'll end up having a heart attack, or at the very least on cholesterol medication. I have 3 months to lower my reading by diet before going back for more tests.

    What the hell do I do? Seems I have to choose between heart attack from high cholesterol, or slow miserable decline in health and then heart attack from *kitten* diabetes.

    I'm at a total loss.

    What does the rest of your lipid panel look like?

    PS. Don't jump! There are many reasons why looking at total cholesterol alone is a bad idea.
  • DietPrada
    DietPrada Posts: 1,171 Member
    I get that but I have to trust that the blood tests show it's going up and my Dr is smart enough to know it's a concern. It's actually been 2 separate doctors who've said it's an issue.
  • Sunny_Bunny_
    Sunny_Bunny_ Posts: 7,140 Member
    The total in itself is meaningless though. It's the particle count, trigs to HDL ratio that you want to evaluate. And then whether or not there's actually any presence of artherosclorosis.
  • AlexandraCarlyle
    AlexandraCarlyle Posts: 1,603 Member
    @EbonyDahlia another website (to which I have been recommended) has a thread on this very subject. You may like to take a look here, it's a long thread, with many comments, but you may be able to glean more info... @Sunny_Bunny_ also, has always talked huge sense, to me....
  • AlexandraCarlyle
    AlexandraCarlyle Posts: 1,603 Member
    edited April 2017
    I have a very good friend whose son has diabetes type I and has to monitor his intake, sugar levels and blood count on a daily basis. She's both intelligent and very informed about all manner of dietary factors. She's frankly, in my opinion, a better nutritionist than some people who make it their profession...

    here's what she wrote in a completely separate discussion with someone else whose concerns were similar to yours...
    cholesterol is made by the body and is minimally impacted by consuming cholesterol. It is actually made in excess by the body in reaction to a high carb/high sugar diet. It is kind of like the tar they use to fill potholes. Sugar damages your vascular system, and your body creates cholesterol, in part, to repair that damage. So it goes along patching the damage. But just like the potholes, it is not as good as the original and over time it causes issues that contribute to clogged arteries.

    One of the big problems is that western diets manage the fat/carb combination horribly. Not only do we eat too many carbs and way too much refined sugar, but we also eat bad fats. it's an awful combination. The body cannot easily deal with both. Too many carbs means they get stored as fat and because the body isn't trained to use fat as energy, that gets stored, too. It's a double whammy. When you remove carbs from the equation (largely) the body much better deals with saturated fats. Just make sure your diet stays balanced and you eat a lot of healthy fats - plant oils, avocados, grass fed dairy if you can find and afford it, etc. Don't eat too much processed meat. It is very strange initially to eat all the stuff we've been told so long is bad for us. But it's not true. The study that that was all based on was no good, almost as bad as the autism study that faked results to make people believe vaccines cause autism. We've been lied to the entire time. It really is all about insulin and how it works in the body under optimal conditions versus under our current western diet. It has a huge impact on how our body deals with fat.

    She also posted this link:

    https://authoritynutrition.com/23-studies-on-low-carb-and-low-fat-diets/

    Hope this helps. :)
  • esaucier17
    esaucier17 Posts: 694 Member
    I have lowered my cholesterol by taking Red Yeast Rice from the health food store while I continued eating low carb. I ignored my Dr. telling me to eat low cholesterol, low fat and threatening statins...and my numbers came down. I lowered my LDL and raised my HDL, I agree with the other posters to look at all you numbers, especially your LDL.
  • kilroy02
    kilroy02 Posts: 37 Member
    Atkins said to take vitamin b5. It's helped my husband lower his cholesterol.

    https://www.atkins.com/how-it-works/library/articles/a-vitamin-regimen-for-optimal-health
  • cstehansen
    cstehansen Posts: 1,984 Member
    @EbonyDahlia - Just thought I would share this article from GreenMedInfo.com. In case the link requires a membership to view, I pasted it below as well. The advantage to the weblink is there are lots of links to the actual studies in it.

    Also, statins have been proven to lower cholesterol, BUT even the most favorable studies show that 42 people have to use them for 4 years in order to see a benefit of 1 less heart attack. Meanwhile, studies show up to 1 in 5 people have an adverse reaction including kidney damage, memory loss, stroke, muscle pain, muscle deterioration......just saying, I think they should look at whether they actually help stop the real disease (heart disease) and not some marker that they think may relate to that disease but have no proof (cholesterol level).

    http://www.greenmedinfo.com/blog/underreported-dangers-low-cholesterol
    You've heard for decades about the dangers of high cholesterol, but did you know that LOW cholesterol can lead to violence towards self and other, and has been linked to premature aging, death and other adverse health effects?

    In a world gone mad with anti-cholesterol anxiety, and where gobbling down pharmaceuticals designed to poison the body into no longer synthesizing it is somehow considered sane behavior, it is refreshing to look at some of the research on the health benefits of cholesterol, or conversely, the dangers of low cholesterol.

    Benefits of Cholesterol
    Cholesterol Is Needed To Prevent Aggression: It has been known for almost 30 years that low serum cholesterol levels are associated with habitually violent tendencies of homicidal offenders under the influence of alcohol. Since then, there are at least 8 other studies that have either confirmed or explored the cholesterol-violence link, including both violence towards self and other. One of the possible explanations for this association was discussed in an article published in the British Journal of Psychiatry in 1993: "One of the functions of serotonin in the central nervous system is the suppression of harmful behaviour impulses...Low membrane cholesterol decreases the number of serotonin receptors. Since membrane cholesterol exchanges freely with cholesterol in the surrounding medium, a lowered serum cholesterol concentration may contribute to a decrease in brain serotonin, with poorer suppression of aggressive behaviour".[ii] Not surprisingly, several reports have now surfaced on cholesterol-lowering statin drugs contributing to irritability and/or aggression.
    Cholesterol Is Needed To Fight Cancer: The inverse relationship between cholesterol levels and the risk for a variety of cancers, and mortality associated with cancer, has been known about since the late 80's.[iii] Since then, the cholesterol-cancer connection has been confirmed over and over again. It is to be expected, therefore, that statin drug use would be linked with increased cancer incidence, which indeed it is.[iv] Even when you take so-called "bad" LDL-cholesterol and administer it to a culture of highly malignant, multi-drug resistant leukemia cells, the cells lose their resistance to chemotherapy. Not exactly what can be characterized as a "bad" substance, now is it? [v]
    Cholesterol Is Needed To Prevent Hemorrhagic Stroke: There are two types of stroke: 1) Ischemic, associated with lack of blood flow and oxygen to the brain 2) Hemorrhagic, associated with the rupture of a blood vessel in the brain, and bleeding. The risk for the former, in theory, could be raised in the presence of excessive oxidized cholesterol. However, it is the risk for the second, hemorrhagic stroke, which is increased when cholesterol levels are low. Noted as far back as 1994 in the British Medical Journal, in an article titled, "Assessing possible hazards of reducing serum cholesterol," researchers found "The only cause of death attributable to low serum cholesterol concentration was haemorrhagic stroke."[vi] Other studies can be viewed that confirm this association on our stroke-cholesterol link page.
    Cholesterol Is Needed for Memory: Low HDL cholesterol has been identified as a risk factor for deficit and decline in memory in midlife.[vii] Even in Parkinson's disease, higher total serum cholesterol concentrations are associated with slower clinical progression of the disease.[viii] Statin drugs, which inhibit the production of cholesterol, hence severely affecting the brain, are now required by the FDA to display the black box warning that they may adversely affect the memory.[ix] We have indexed over 50 studies from the National Library of Medicine's bibliographic database, Medline, on the neurotoxicity of statin drugs, with six of these specifically addressing statin-induced memory impairment.
    Cholesterol is Needed for Longevity: In a fascinating study published in PLoS in 2011, telomere length – the shoestring cap-like ends of the chromosomes which prevent DNA damage associated with cellular aging – was linked to higher LDL and total cholesterol levels. The longer the length of these protective caps, the higher the cholesterol.[x] Indeed, several studies indicate that lower cholesterol is associated with increased mortality.
    Cholesterol Helps Us Fight Infection: It has been observed that a cholesterol-rich diet improves patients with tuberculosis, leading researchers to suggest "cholesterol should be used as a complementary measure in antitubercular treatment."[xi] Cholesterol-lowering drugs, incidentally, exhibit immunosuppressive and potent immunotoxic properties, likely in part due to their cholesterol depleting effects.
    Given that cholesterol is essential for all animal life and that each cell is capable of synthesizing it from simpler molecules, we should not be surprised by examples provided above of cholesterol's significant health benefits. Nor should it be surprising that cholesterol-lowering drugs have over 300 adverse health effects. For now, suffice it to say, that conventional medical practice would do well to receive instruction from basic principles of biology, rather than simply the drug-company marketing copy it increasingly falls prey to.

  • pitbullmamaliz
    pitbullmamaliz Posts: 303 Member
    cstehansen wrote: »
    Also, statins have been proven to lower cholesterol, BUT even the most favorable studies show that 42 people have to use them for 4 years in order to see a benefit of 1 less heart attack. Meanwhile, studies show up to 1 in 5 people have an adverse reaction including kidney damage, memory loss, stroke, muscle pain, muscle deterioration......just saying, I think they should look at whether they actually help stop the real disease (heart disease) and not some marker that they think may relate to that disease but have no proof (cholesterol level).

    I assume by 42, you mean 42%? Those are really appalling statistics. I had no idea!
  • RAC56
    RAC56 Posts: 432 Member
    There are several things that can help to bring cholesterol numbers down. Good fish oils, flax seed MEAL (has to be the meal) and almonds. Niacin (not the non-flush kind) will also usually lower cholesterol but must be used with caution, beginning with a very low dose. There are other things out there as well.
  • cstehansen
    cstehansen Posts: 1,984 Member
    cstehansen wrote: »
    Also, statins have been proven to lower cholesterol, BUT even the most favorable studies show that 42 people have to use them for 4 years in order to see a benefit of 1 less heart attack. Meanwhile, studies show up to 1 in 5 people have an adverse reaction including kidney damage, memory loss, stroke, muscle pain, muscle deterioration......just saying, I think they should look at whether they actually help stop the real disease (heart disease) and not some marker that they think may relate to that disease but have no proof (cholesterol level).

    I assume by 42, you mean 42%? Those are really appalling statistics. I had no idea!

    No. I mean 42 people have to be treated for 4 years to prevent 1 total heart attack.
  • pitbullmamaliz
    pitbullmamaliz Posts: 303 Member
    OOHH, I see what you're saying. That's insane.
  • Sunny_Bunny_
    Sunny_Bunny_ Posts: 7,140 Member
    cstehansen wrote: »
    cstehansen wrote: »
    Also, statins have been proven to lower cholesterol, BUT even the most favorable studies show that 42 people have to use them for 4 years in order to see a benefit of 1 less heart attack. Meanwhile, studies show up to 1 in 5 people have an adverse reaction including kidney damage, memory loss, stroke, muscle pain, muscle deterioration......just saying, I think they should look at whether they actually help stop the real disease (heart disease) and not some marker that they think may relate to that disease but have no proof (cholesterol level).

    I assume by 42, you mean 42%? Those are really appalling statistics. I had no idea!

    No. I mean 42 people have to be treated for 4 years to prevent 1 total heart attack.

    Yeah. Isn't it like half of 1% of people have any measurable benefit or something?
  • DietPrada
    DietPrada Posts: 1,171 Member
    If carbs cause cholesterol to rise then how come my cholesterol has gone from normal to sky high in the time I've been eating under 20g carbs a day? That just doesn't make sense.
  • cstehansen
    cstehansen Posts: 1,984 Member
    If carbs cause cholesterol to rise then how come my cholesterol has gone from normal to sky high in the time I've been eating under 20g carbs a day? That just doesn't make sense.

    Carbs will raise your triglycerides and vLDL which are the most atherogenic parts of cholesterol. That means they damage the inside of the arteries.

    One of the jobs cholesterol has is to patch that damage. More damage means more patching which is what leads to clogged arteries.

    Blaming cholesterol is like blaming the firemen because they are at all the house fires. If there was no fire, the firemen wouldn't be there. In the same way, if there was no damage, cholesterol would keep flowing delivering the lipids to cells to burn for energy.

    If you really want to know risk, you need to have a scan to see your calcium score which is if and how much plaque has built up in your arteries. Lower number is better.
  • DietPrada
    DietPrada Posts: 1,171 Member
    I am in Australia. They don't do those tests. All I know is before keto my cholesterol levels were fine, now they are not. I don't believe its "nothing to worry about", doctors aren't stupid. I am just angry that I was stupid enough to buy into the whole "eat all the fat it's good for you" rubbish. I feel I've traded one death sentence (diabetes) for another. Keto is the cause, high cholesterol does not run in my family and I had no issues before.
  • kpk54
    kpk54 Posts: 4,474 Member
    edited April 2017
    I heard that fireman analogy just the other day in an LC video @cstehansen. Good one for driving home your talking points.

    @EbonyDahlia, any reason why you cannot try a more moderate macro approach? I won't speak specifically regarding TD2 or cholesterol but another of your goals is weigh loss and many lose weight via methods other than keto. I understand the effectiveness of it for hunger and craving management but you yourself have said it is not magic for weight loss and calories matter. Now with 4 years under your belt of effectively managing calories, try another more moderate macro approach and see if that works for all three.

    All people who have lost weight did not lose via keto. All people who have successfully reversed their T2D have not done so via eating keto level of carbs. And generally speaking, people who have improved their cholesterol (to their and their doc's opinion/satisfaction as to what improved means) have done so via a variety of diets.
  • baconslave
    baconslave Posts: 7,018 Member
    edited April 2017
    I am in Australia. They don't do those tests. All I know is before keto my cholesterol levels were fine, now they are not. I don't believe its "nothing to worry about", doctors aren't stupid. I am just angry that I was stupid enough to buy into the whole "eat all the fat it's good for you" rubbish. I feel I've traded one death sentence (diabetes) for another. Keto is the cause, high cholesterol does not run in my family and I had no issues before.

    Really. It's not the total at all.
    My cholesterol is "high." By a couple of points. Why? because my HDL is very high. Trigs were very low. The rest was LDL. I don't even remember the number, because it doesn't matter, but it wasn't high for LDL. My total was just high because my HDL skewed the whole thing.

    I have a friend in another forum who lost a lot of weight doing LCHF, but then his LDL went up pretty high and stayed. He recently made some changes and got it to go down. I'll ask him for his strategies and see what he comes up with.
  • nvmomketo
    nvmomketo Posts: 12,019 Member
    During weight loss, cholesterol and triglycerides tend to go up. I think it is about 6 months into maintenance when it normalizes.

    It seems to me that the only people whose cholesterol is made worse by LCHF are those with familial cholesterolemia. Could that be it?

    If LDL is normal, or near normal, and total cholesterol is high, I would try not to be concerned. As a middle aged woman, I would find low cholesterol more alarming. KWIM?
  • DietPrada
    DietPrada Posts: 1,171 Member
    Thanks all. Over the weekend I've had a rethink on all of my food. Doing keto for so long I had it pretty much bedded down and tended to eat the same things a lot so now it's all new. I ended up with about 80g carbs (all from avocado and vegetables) 130g protein (fish and chicken) and 50g fat. I'm worried the carbs are too high, but I need to eat something. It's going to take some work, I am crazy hungry this morning, like I haven't been since doing Keto - I assume both from the increased carbs and the low fat. I just hope the carbs are still low enough not to have negative effect on my blood sugar.
  • kpk54
    kpk54 Posts: 4,474 Member
    Good luck with it @EbonyDahlia. I hope you adapt for satiation and it eases your mind regarding cholesterol. I find it odd that the docs in Australia won't do extra testing even if you ask.
  • 2t9nty
    2t9nty Posts: 1,626 Member
    Dunno - I always had cholesterol in the 200 range with a statin. The last time they checked it, it was 156, and I just stopped taking the statin and told the nurse why at the next appointment. They will check it again in July, and I will see where it is then.
  • kilroy02
    kilroy02 Posts: 37 Member
    ctehanson,

    Don't trust those calcium studies. My mother had it done and it came back horrible. The cardiologist told her not to worry, they are usually wrong. They did a cardiac catheterization procedure and the doctor said he could drive a truck through her arteries. He was over exaggerating of course. But he said those tests are useless. You get too many false positives.

    That was over 20 years ago, my ma is 80 and still ticking.
  • RalfLott
    RalfLott Posts: 5,036 Member
    edited April 2017
    @kilroy02 - Assuming that the scoring of calcium build-up is often inaccurately high, what would you say about a negative result? If no calcium appears, couldn't one conclude that there's no plaque accumulation? For someone with diabetes or dyslipidemia, I would imagine such a result would be a relief.

    And wouldn't any positive scan show there's at least some calcium present?

    As I understand it, the test and scoring (something about which cardiologists appear to disagree) are designed to produce a rough probability, not a date certain, of a cardiac event. So I'm not sure what to make of the happy fact that your grandma is still going at it at 80.

  • dasher602014
    dasher602014 Posts: 1,992 Member
    Thanks all. Over the weekend I've had a rethink on all of my food. Doing keto for so long I had it pretty much bedded down and tended to eat the same things a lot so now it's all new. I ended up with about 80g carbs (all from avocado and vegetables) 130g protein (fish and chicken) and 50g fat. I'm worried the carbs are too high, but I need to eat something. It's going to take some work, I am crazy hungry this morning, like I haven't been since doing Keto - I assume both from the increased carbs and the low fat. I just hope the carbs are still low enough not to have negative effect on my blood sugar.

    I am in your boat too. My HDL and LDL are close to a one to one relationship. Trigs are very low. Total cholesterol is high. They don't do the other tests here in Canada either.

    As you might remember, when I got the same news from my doctor, I lifted my carbs to between 50-60 grams and ate a good deal of oatmeal and beans. I ate about 30 -40 grams of fiber a day. And I lowered my fats to about 35 grams. I added fish oil and other supplements. The result: I lowered my HDL and LDL. The LDL from 2.4 to 2.2. I was commended for my efforts but it was not enough to keep them happy. We have to live within the health care systems that we have today. I think you remember my concerns/freakouts over adapting my diet to this regime of low fat, especially as I was gluten and lactose intolerant and living with a diabetic. A very difficult 3 months with little to eat, very hungry and little return for my effort.

    IMHO, diabetes is by far the worse of the two evils. I don't seem to have that problem but it is in my family. Our neighbour just died this weekend from it and my DH is low carb (at the doctors suggestion - Atkins induction levels) because of it. So it is the forefront of our minds at the moment. IMO, Taking a statin to lower your LDL levels is a lesser evil that following the carb trail down the diabetes path. And I know statins increase risk of diabetes or make diabetes worse. (when you are a diabetic, they put you on a statin anyway because your heart attack risk is elevated because of the disease!)

    I am still haven't found my answer yet either. One possibility that I have been thinking of is the CSIRO Low Carb diet.

    We bought the CSIRO Low Carb cookbook when we were in Australia in April. Although the book does seem to steer away from their own conclusions when it gets close to a result that "keto is good", its does have some good suggestions about low carb (50 grams a day), and "healthy fats" (and I know that is debatable too). It would take you from keto to low carb with high fiber and high fat. It might keep you off both the high cholesterol or pre-diabetes track. We have also found the recipes themselves to be good although we do adjust them for DH 30 grams requirements.

    I wouldn't take a low fat diet as an answer when you are staring down diabetes. Perhaps your doctor would accept the CSIRO research and be supportive of a low carb healthy fat diet (as they call it).
  • RalfLott
    RalfLott Posts: 5,036 Member
    edited April 2017
    @dasher602014, if I weren't already on board, your eloquence would have done the trick!
    Taking a statin to lower your LDL levels is a lesser evil that following the carb trail down the diabetes path.

    I wouldn't take a low fat diet as an answer when you are staring down diabetes. Perhaps your doctor would accept the CSIRO research and be supportive of a low carb healthy fat diet (as they call it).

    That's exactly it! I have to think most of us arrived at LC by way of choosing lesser evils: exacerbating diabetes with carbs is surely going to be the greater one most of the time.
  • Dragonwolf
    Dragonwolf Posts: 5,600 Member
    A couple of things to keep in mind:

    As mentioned, total alone is worthless. This isn't opinion from the blogosphere. This is the result of Framingham, the largest and longest running cohort heart study. If there was something to be found, they'd have found it. They found zero connection between total cholesterol alone and risk.

    What matters most are the ratios.

    HOWEVER, LDL is almost never directly measured. It's calculated using a formula that is known to break down when triglycerides go outside a sort of "median" range.

    ALSO, LDL will go up on this way of eating in the standard tests, but it's not necessarily a bad thing. This is because the test measures concentration. LDL particle size tends to go up while the count stays more or less the same, which actually decreases their danger (because it's the small, very low density ones that are "sticky" and clog things up). The concentration measurement goes up, because size increases concentration, too. In that situation, you're actually hurting yourself by forcing it down.

    I highly recommend getting at least the direct measure of your LDL particles before going on medication, or before freaking out too much. While the single payer countries might not do the test by default, and you may need to pay out of pocket for it, you should be able to still request it.

    On a side note, there are some people who react poorly to saturated fats. They do better with getting most of their fats from monounsaturated sources, even without going lower fat. So, if you find yourself in the old strughles with hunger and whatnot with the lower fat and higher carb levels, that's another route you can try.
  • dasher602014
    dasher602014 Posts: 1,992 Member
    @RalfLott , :) thanks.
  • 1thankful_momma
    1thankful_momma Posts: 298 Member
    @EbonyDahlia Have you read this article?
    https://authoritynutrition.com/low-carb-diets-and-cholesterol/

    Lot's of helpful things to consider
  • TheDevastator
    TheDevastator Posts: 1,626 Member
    I'd have to go with niacin(nicotinic acid) and pantethine(active b5). Niacin can cause flushing if you take too large a dose right off the bat and should be taken with food.