What, my Cholesterol's High?

Often the diagnosis of high cholesterol levels comes out

of the blue.

The questions pour in: what does this mean; why; how do I

lower my cholesterol?

The search for information and for change starts.

Cholesterol in itself isn't bad, in fact, it's essential

for good health. The membranes surrounding each of our

cells, many hormones and bile which is important for digesting

our food - all of these need cholesterol and so our bodies

will actually make it's own cholesterol.

The problem usually arises when we have a diet that is

high in animal products, meat, cream and certain fats. We end

up eating a lot more cholesterol than our body needs.

And when we have lots more cholesterol than we need - imagine pouring hot meat fat down a sink, watch it cool and congeal- once it has solidified and stuck like glue, there's a blocked sink just waiting for a plumber! Too much cholesterol has a similar effect on your blood vessels.

So why didn't we notice?

The thing is having a high cholestorl level doesn't

really have any symptoms. The end effect is usually something very serious - and sure we notice that! Angina, chest pain, stroke, heart-attack - these are the end results for some

people.

For many of us, the first time we know we have high cholesterol levels is the results from a routine blood test. If this is how you found out, great! It means you still have time to make changes before something worse happens to make you stop and take notice.

So what do you do next?

Well, one thing's for certain - you'll end up reading your food labels a lot more carefully than ever before and believe me, it's all in the small print. Who thought that having a diagnosis of high cholesterol could have you rushing to get your eyes tested too!

If your cholesterol levels are very high, your doctor will prescribe medication, probably statins - a family of very powerfull drugs with proven efficacy in reducing blood cholesterol levels. In this case, in the first instance, just keep taking the pills! There's a lot of discussion about statins, their dosage, their side effects and I don't intend to go into too much detail in this article but it's often recommended that you may also want to start taking supplements of co-enzyme Q10 and of niacin.

You can then work to reduce the amount of cholesterol that you eat to bring your body back into balance.

Modifying your diet to reduce cholesterol levels is really easy - and it's not.

In general, the simple advice is: decrease the amount of red or processed meat you eat (steak, burgers, sausages, salami) and increase the amount of vegetables in your diet. If you do this, you're heading in the right direction.

The real problem is looking out for the hidden fats. Once you start looking you'll be amazed - actually horrified - at how much fat there is in many cakes, pastries and pies.

Even your regular latte or cappucino can be hiding hidden fats - the milk and cream are dairy products, derived from animals so potentially high in cholesterol. But don't panic, the simple act of asking for "skinny" will reduce your fat intake without having too much of an impact on your

taste buds.

Sometimes we try to make drastic changes in our diet, we live, (miserably) for a week and then give in and go back to our old ways.

As a first step try small changes in your habits

reduce red meat, dairy products (milk, cream and
butter) and processed food

increase the amount of fruit and vegetables you eat - remember "5 a day" is proven to reduce your risk of cancer too so this way you're onto a win-win situation

ask for "skinny" - choose low fat milk, cream, spreads.

There's so much more to share about changing habits, healthy eating, lowering cholesterol and even - yes, even why you should try to increase you HDL cholesterol levels.

If you want to find more visit my website,

TalkingAboutCholesterol.com [TalkingAboutCholesterol.com] and keep up to

date with my blog.

See you soon,

Lizzie

Lizzie Ballard PhD

talkingabouthealthonline.com Talking about Health blog

TalkingAboutCholesterol.com [TalkingAboutCholesterol.com]

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