Proven Ways to Reduce Cholesterol?

[quote]KSman wrote:
B vitamins have a very strong influence over HDL levels. [/quote]

very true, such as Niacin in the form of “Niacin” not Niacinamide (be sure to look for this on supplement labels) which although has great benefits does nothing for cholesterol. It’s been proven to be equally if not more effective then leading statins.

your mom is super-duper wrong. Fish oil is an unabashed good thing for folks with cholesterol problems. Go to webmd, print out… anything, and make her read it.

What are your HDL and LDL and triglyceride numbers?

Isn’t 16 a little young for something V-Diet?

It blows how your diet/supplement regimen has to go through your mom, but I guess such is the life at that age. I remember going on high fat/high protein diet in college to lose weight and my dad was so adamantly against it. Recently, my dad skeptically went on his own Atkin’s-type diet and supplementing with fish oil by his doctor’s recommendation because of his extremely high cholesterol and it worked like a charm. He lost a ton of weight too. While I didn’t tell him “I told you so” he now buys me fish oil in bulk.

Anyway, yeah, like others have said if your mom won’t let you consume ‘oil’ then try to get her to buy foods that have ‘Omega-3’s’ added - Peanut Butter, Eggs, etc and get her to buy actual fatty fish. Don’t call it fatty though since she is terrified of that word. Maybe just use “Omega-3’s” as the keyword and not “Oil” or “fat”, heh.

You need to hear this. You are in grave danger of drastically shortening your life. To prevent this you should take moderate, but very strict changes to your diet, lifestyle, and begin taking certain supplements. Whether you choose to take my advice or someone else’s is up to you, but I like to think I know what I’m talking about.

Cut out all sugar from your diet. Cut out all simple carbs and starches. Carbs, especially sugar and refined grains, increase insulin (and blood sugar) which has a direct impact on cholesterol levels. Sugar and simple carbs will make things worse, so first and foremost your diet should change. They cause inflammation, and that is exactly what causes high cholesterol.

It sounds like your case might have a genetic component (I shouldn’t guess really), but regardless the source of the high cholesterol is inflammation. Exercise, reducing highly processed, sugary foods, reducing weight, eating healthier, combined with smart supplements will help you to quickly reduce cholesterol.

Work aggressively to lower your bodyfat to a healthy range and don’t stop until you do.

Statin drugs will kill you. That’s not a joke. Google Vioxx as an example.

An animal based omega 3 (fish oil or krill oil) is a great start

The next two are cholesterol lowering things, but honestly they won’t be as good as fish oil:

MSM (which is a very cheap and very natural supplement – it’s similar to onions and is simply a source of sulfur, which is a natural mineral in things like onions) can help lower your cholesterol (also helps tremendously with joints — I bet you have problems with that as well, am i right?)

Beta Sitosterol (also a relatively cheap and healthy supplement) will help to significantly lower your cholesterol.

Any soluble fiber as a supplement is also good for lowering cholesterol. Find a low carb fiber source that you can eat a few times per day. In my opinion oats and other grains are not an effective means to lower cholesterol for someone in your situation, because in my opinion you should reduce carbs, and the carb:fiber ratio is not good in oats, despite what Quaker and cheerios marketing campaigns would lead you to believe)

If you follow this advice, you should be able to make a huge change in a short time (~2-3 months).

Best

Sardines are a great source of omega 3’s. Your Mom should have no problems with sardines, because they are a food source, and inexpensive (99 cents a can, up to 1.99 for the fancy brands). A can of those once a day, or every other day.

Walnuts are the best nut source of healthy fats, with almonds in 2nd place. I wouldn’t make nuts a major part of your diet, more like a nice occasional snack when you want something crunchy, instead of chips. It’s easy to go overboard with nuts IMO.

Ground flax meal is cheap, good source of omega 3 and healthy fiber, and flax is cheap, especially via mail order. Or you can buy it at Whole Foods or a health food store. I like Bobs Red Mill brand for ground flax, and Whole Foods has a 365 brand whole flax seeds, if you wanna grind your own (you can do it a little bitt at a time in a blender). Kind of a hassle though, so I just buy it already ground up now. Mix it in with your protein shakes, you wont notice it.

BulletproofTiger hit the nail on the head.

sugar and refined carbs are a nightmare on your body.

and your mother is an idiot if she thinks dietary fat diet should be avoided, shove some fish oil in her ignorant cunt.

[quote]Broseph wrote:
BulletproofTiger hit the nail on the head.

sugar and refined carbs are a nightmare on your body.

and your mother is an idiot if she thinks dietary fat diet should be avoided, shove some fish oil in her ignorant cunt.[/quote]

Somebody has mommy issues.

[quote]Vicomte wrote:
If you’re really worried, get some lipitor.[/quote]

Fixed that for you.

Seriously, I had a consult with a doctor several years ago in California who is a leader in researching cholesterol and related disease states re: my high cholesterol (genetic). I mentioned that I had started taking a fairly large dose of fish oil and he laughed at me and said “well, that’s a nice thought”. If your high cholesterol is genetic then you NEED to get on some medication as simply changing your diet and taking more omega-3 isn’t going to fix it.

High cholesterol is a broad condition that can have any number of underlying causes, trying to assign a single catch all supplement as a fix is fairly square peg/round hole.

As for the “statins will kill you, google Vioxx” statement, that’s fairly ignorant. Just because a single drug in broad category is bad doesn’t mean that every drug in that broad category is. Lipitor is one of the most widely used and proven drugs available today. Some of the newere “super statins” may be riskier, but Lipitor is a pretty safe bet.

[quote]Stronghold wrote:

[quote]Vicomte wrote:
If you’re really worried, get some lipitor.[/quote]

Fixed that for you.

Seriously, I had a consult with a doctor several years ago in California who is a leader in researching cholesterol and related disease states re: my high cholesterol (genetic). I mentioned that I had started taking a fairly large dose of fish oil and he laughed at me and said “well, that’s a nice thought”. If your high cholesterol is genetic then you NEED to get on some medication as simply changing your diet and taking more omega-3 isn’t going to fix it.

High cholesterol is a broad condition that can have any number of underlying causes, trying to assign a single catch all supplement as a fix is fairly square peg/round hole.

As for the “statins will kill you, google Vioxx” statement, that’s fairly ignorant. Just because a single drug in broad category is bad doesn’t mean that every drug in that broad category is. Lipitor is one of the most widely used and proven drugs available today. Some of the newere “super statins” may be riskier, but Lipitor is a pretty safe bet.[/quote]

Well shit. If you’re gonna get all genetic on me…

[quote]Stronghold wrote:

[quote]Vicomte wrote:
If you’re really worried, get some lipitor.[/quote]

Fixed that for you.

Seriously, I had a consult with a doctor several years ago in California who is a leader in researching cholesterol and related disease states re: my high cholesterol (genetic). I mentioned that I had started taking a fairly large dose of fish oil and he laughed at me and said “well, that’s a nice thought”. If your high cholesterol is genetic then you NEED to get on some medication as simply changing your diet and taking more omega-3 isn’t going to fix it.

High cholesterol is a broad condition that can have any number of underlying causes, trying to assign a single catch all supplement as a fix is fairly square peg/round hole.

As for the “statins will kill you, google Vioxx” statement, that’s fairly ignorant. Just because a single drug in broad category is bad doesn’t mean that every drug in that broad category is. Lipitor is one of the most widely used and proven drugs available today. Some of the newere “super statins” may be riskier, but Lipitor is a pretty safe bet.[/quote]

Let me just ask you this: Is heart disease risk lowered by taking statin drugs?

[quote]BulletproofTiger wrote:

[quote]Stronghold wrote:

[quote]Vicomte wrote:
If you’re really worried, get some lipitor.[/quote]

Fixed that for you.

Seriously, I had a consult with a doctor several years ago in California who is a leader in researching cholesterol and related disease states re: my high cholesterol (genetic). I mentioned that I had started taking a fairly large dose of fish oil and he laughed at me and said “well, that’s a nice thought”. If your high cholesterol is genetic then you NEED to get on some medication as simply changing your diet and taking more omega-3 isn’t going to fix it.

High cholesterol is a broad condition that can have any number of underlying causes, trying to assign a single catch all supplement as a fix is fairly square peg/round hole.

As for the “statins will kill you, google Vioxx” statement, that’s fairly ignorant. Just because a single drug in broad category is bad doesn’t mean that every drug in that broad category is. Lipitor is one of the most widely used and proven drugs available today. Some of the newere “super statins” may be riskier, but Lipitor is a pretty safe bet.[/quote]

Let me just ask you this: Is heart disease risk lowered by taking statin drugs?[/quote]

Statin drugs dont claim to do that.

Just keep on making good food choices and exercising :slight_smile: Sorry this thread is getting COMPLETELY out of control. Good job on decreasing your total cholesterol.

I mentioned a few things to help you out. One thing that I briefly mentioned was Krill oil. At just 500 mg, it’s been shown to increase good cholesterol. It’s better than fish oil for this because the EPA and DHA in Krill is in the phosphatidylcholine form, whereas in fish oil, the EPA and DHA is in triglyceride form. This doesn’t mean fish oil is no good. It just means you can take less Krill oil and get a good result. The EPA and DHA in Krill is absorbed about 15X more effectively, on a mg per mg basis, than fish oil.

Also check out something called HIIT (high intensity interval training). You may already know what it is and have been doing it, but it will lower your cholesterol as well, and it’s free!

[quote]BONEZ217 wrote:

[quote]BulletproofTiger wrote:

Let me just ask you this: Is heart disease risk lowered by taking statin drugs?[/quote]

Statin drugs dont claim to do that. [/quote]

Then why would a doctor prescribe a statin drug? Isn’t it because high cholesterol is a risk factor for heart disease? Please enlighten me.

There are no conclusive studies that prove without a doubt that high cholesterol levels actually contribute to increased death due to heart disease. What does exist are a lot of studies linking incidence of heart disease to a number of factors, one being high cholestrol levels. What these studies do not prove is the root cause of the deaths due to heart disease, as people with high cholesterol tend to carry more body fat, excercise less, and smoke more than those with lower cholestrol levels. These same people are telling us to use trans-fat laden margarine instead of butter as saturated fat will kill you.

Your body, which a product of thousands of years of evolution, produces cholesterol for a reason. It is a well known fact that consuming cholesterol-laden foods will not raise your total blood chlosterol levels significantly as your body will simply make more/less to compensate. If cholestrol is bad for you, why would this be so?

Statin drugs are one of the most profitable products for pharmaceutical companies.

OP has never responded with his cholesterol numbers. He may be knocking at death’s door, or his cholesterol may be fine, and his mom just terribly bad at nutrition.

[quote]BulletproofTiger wrote:

[quote]BONEZ217 wrote:

[quote]BulletproofTiger wrote:

Let me just ask you this: Is heart disease risk lowered by taking statin drugs?[/quote]

Statin drugs dont claim to do that. [/quote]

Then why would a doctor prescribe a statin drug? Isn’t it because high cholesterol is a risk factor for heart disease? Please enlighten me. [/quote]

Youre guess is as good as mine. Big bucks for big pharma is my guess. Doctors getting kickbacks/perks for signing their name on the script/ignorance

I learned several tips on how to lower my cholesterol levels, and reduce heart disease risk, by reading this cardiologist’s blog.

http://heartscanblog.blogspot.com/

Some of the basic supplements that can help are:

2000 to 3000 mgs of EPA/DHA from fish oil a day
8000ius of D3 a day. D3 is great at raising HDL cholesterol. If you take vitamin D3 be sure to read the Dr’s articles on how to properly do it.
Iodine from kelp is good at lowering LDL
Low carb diet, as you already eat.
Vitamin K2
Magnesium

Isn’t the high cholesterol/heart disease association flawed? I was under the impression that inflammation is of greater concern and that it is the combination of the two (and not just high cholesterol) that leads to atherosclerosis.

[quote]EasyRhino wrote:
OP has never responded with his cholesterol numbers. He may be knocking at death’s door, or his cholesterol may be fine, and his mom just terribly bad at nutrition.[/quote]

i genuinely don’t know my numbers. my doctor said my blood work in general was “extremely good for someone of my age and generation”
the reason i created this thread was because i added olive oil into my diet(taste’s great in shakes!), and my mom thinks this is gonna increase my cholesterol because it’s “fat”.

i asked for ways to make my bloodwork perfect, because if there’s any minuscule flaw, ALL fat will be taken away from me ranging from the salmon i eat to the olive oil.

(also, looked up that walnuts have omega 3’s in em, and i’m loving them!)

[quote]deadliftgoal500 wrote:

[quote]EasyRhino wrote:
OP has never responded with his cholesterol numbers. He may be knocking at death’s door, or his cholesterol may be fine, and his mom just terribly bad at nutrition.[/quote]

i genuinely don’t know my numbers. my doctor said my blood work in general was “extremely good for someone of my age and generation”
the reason i created this thread was because i added olive oil into my diet(taste’s great in shakes!), and my mom thinks this is gonna increase my cholesterol because it’s “fat”.

i asked for ways to make my bloodwork perfect, because if there’s any minuscule flaw, ALL fat will be taken away from me ranging from the salmon i eat to the olive oil.

(also, looked up that walnuts have omega 3’s in em, and i’m loving them!)[/quote]

You’re on the right track. If you can pick up the fish or krill oil and some of the other stuff, you’ll be doing even better.