So the other day my dad made a comment in passing about how I’m going to die from heart disease before I’m 30 due to my bulking diet.
He was referring to the amount of cholesterol and saturated fat I consume from eggs (I have 3 large for breakfast every day), 85% lean hamburger meat, other read meat and about 8 glasses of milk a day (currently 1% but I bounce back and fourth between 2% and whole). Is this a legitimate concern and should I adjust my diet to account for this? I’m making steady gains on Starting Strength and have been gaining about a pound a week.
Have him name one animal that naturally eats meat/eggs and dies from western diseases, or name one animal that makes a kill and only eats the white meat, or throws away the yolks… God ain’t dumb, he didn’t put saturated fat/cholesterol in stuff to kill us.
Excellent response, thank you very much. I’m researching this as I type this but perhaps someone can help answer a fat related question. I’ve been using canola oil to cook with and I drink about two teaspoons of canola oil a day just for the healthy fat content. Is this a good way to add healthy fat to my diet or is canola oil bogus?
Well, the dairy saturated fats and cholesterol eaten probably are not as big of an issue when it comes to developing heart disease. An article that might be of help on that is Dr. Guyenet’s recent study review paper.
“New Review Paper by Yours Truly: High-Fat Dairy, Obesity, Metabolic Health and Cardiovascular Disease”
When it comes to detecting heart disease, what you want to be concerned about is plaque growth. There are hundreds of risk factors for plaque to form, some of the more common being - high blood pressure, low vitamin D3 levels, dental problems, diabetes, osteoporosis, etc. There is a inexpensive way to test for plaque. A heart CT scan can show if you are at high risk for a cardiac. What the scan does is detect for calcium buildup in arteries. Thought this a nice article by a cardiologist on heart CT scans.
[quote]jehovasfitness wrote:
Have him name one animal that naturally eats meat/eggs and dies from western diseases, or name one animal that makes a kill and only eats the white meat, or throws away the yolks… God ain’t dumb, he didn’t put saturated fat/cholesterol in stuff to kill us.
[/quote]
Short solution would be to just get it checked. High LDL is associated with risks for CAD, as is low HDL. Assuming you are eating a healthy diet, lean cuts of beef, not McDonalds, higher fiber, good portions of veggies and actually exercising you should be good. But that leaves out genetics, that said familial hypercholesterolemia (genetic high LDL) is 1:800 or so.
[quote]radagasdcar wrote:
Excellent response, thank you very much. I’m researching this as I type this but perhaps someone can help answer a fat related question. I’ve been using canola oil to cook with and I drink about two teaspoons of canola oil a day just for the healthy fat content. Is this a good way to add healthy fat to my diet or is canola oil bogus?[/quote]
Don’t know what you’re cooking, but what about olive oil? Maybe try flax or fish oil when you supplement. Obviously, you can’t cook with them but using oil richer in omega 3’s is better from an anti-inflammatory standpoint. Unless you’re eating grass fed beef, you probably are getting lots of omega 6’s in your diet. Omega 6: Omega 3 ratio is important for your overall health.
I wouldn’t use EVOO for cooking, technically the smoke point is around 350 so you could at low temps, I just don’t prefer it… go with real butter or coconut oil, or if you got the money macadamia nut oil, high smoke point and high omega-3 content
[quote]jehovasfitness wrote:
ditch the canola, that shit in excess will be far more problmatic than any naturally occuring fat.
do EVOO or coconut oil shots, EVOO goes down better… coconut oil is ok in shot form, but goes best in protein shakes
and yes, coconut oil has a high sat fat % content than even meat, but that shit is good for ya, google it…
btw- to the poster above, high LDL is not a great risk factor of CVD, depends on the size of the particles ;)[/quote]
Agreed on the EVOO and coconut oil.
size of particles certainly matter, but high LDL is still a fairly good marker in the real world, you can also measure hsCRP but it’s not as common yet within the medical community (that I know of). The point is more that measure cholesterol at least give a starting point to look at.
LDL has been clearly shown to be a poor marker, that said, if they’re crazy elevated there may be some underlying issue, but just because someone is at “high” 130 shouldn’t worry someone, unless they get their particle size/count done as well.
