A test has revealed that my “bad” cholesterol is pretty high (8) for my age (37), and since Monday I’ve been on a drastically different diet.

No more cake, ice cream, bacon, sausages, pies, mayo, chocolate, biscuits, nice cheese, butter, fried eggs etc etc.

I’ve also got high “good” cholesterol, so will be continuing to eat plenty of oily fish and olive oil – but with extra fruit, veg, nuts and carbs instead of the naughty things above. And that Benecol marge.

Bonus is I get to ride my bike more without feeling guilty: “sorry darling, doctor’s orders”

Got three months to get the level down, otherwise the doc will break out the drugs.

Anyone else been here and done it? Did it work? How long to adjust to new diet and lose kitkat cravings? How long to start losing weight (this better happen too!)?

Cheers!

I am sat waiting on my results (33) so will be watching this.

Put cholestrol and myth into google, bing, yahoo etc.
Drug companies have to make a living some how I suppose.

Would the ‘iDave’ diet help? His didn’t allow many of those items, although the meat was allowed.

It’s couple of years or so back so the figures are a bit dim in my memory but I got down from about 6 to about 3-4 I think just by diet change (much as yours and taking nuts to work to nibble on instead of biscuits). Whatever it was, the Doc was quite surprised that such a reduction came from diet change alone, particularly given the family history.

Also watching in interest as awaiting results (36 and dodgy family history of cholesterol levels)…

I think that diet alone can only lower it by 15%

You need to take something (statins) if you want a drastic improvement.

Speaking from experience, look at the sat fat on all foods and adjust diet accordingly, eat oats, take 3 cholesterol lowering yoghurts a week, job done, oh, and avoid statins like the plague.

Also get the risk factor test and remember that current thinking takes into account the ratio between good and bad, not just the outright figures.

OP
Diet has surprisingly small effect compared with something like statins.

Apparently statins can drop your cholesterol level by 25%.

Having said that I have recently taken mine from 4.2 to 3.8 through diet having been on statins for many years. That change has been totally through diet over three months, which I’m pleased with.

I am no doctor, however I am reasonably well informed by medical people since having a heart attack in September.

More controversial than I expected.

Why you say avoid statins cupra? Side-effects? Did you do it just with diet?

orangecrush – Glad to hear it worked for you. And that I’m on the right track.

Glad this thread came up. I’m overweight, had a poor diet since I was about 17 (20 years) and never had my cholesterol tested!

Just booked a test for monday, do they give you the results there and then or do they have to send off for the results?

I had a medical 2 years ago, bad chloresterol was silly-high and the dr got excited and told me to back off diet or face the dreaded tablets. The scare worked for a bit and then of course I have ermmm forgotten ermmmm to have it re-tested and diet has drifted a tad. However I now have a medical in just over a week and am more than slightly concerned what’s going to turn up there. Wondering if a crash diet for a week will get the blasted things down in order to get through the test……

loddrick – You have to wait. I went for test then phoned GP a week later when results in and booked an appointment.

In my case I had a not-that-bad diet up until about two years ago when I started eating meat and working from home.

Gone a bit mad on sausages, pies, cakes and chocolate recently though. My wife feels the same way about pies and cakes that I do about bikes. She’s northern.

I’m hoping if I revert to my good old ways I’ll be OK. Shame I never got tested before to establish a baseline.

good luck ononeorange

I was diagnosed with type II diabetes and my cholesterol had rocketed for no apparant reason (except my body/immune system is screwed) to 9.6 back in 2004 at the age of 39. I initially tried to get both under control with drastic diet and upping exerices levels to ridiculous levels for three months and neither dropped any (think from memory the cjolesterol dropped to about 8.9). Ended up on all sorts of tablets one of which was a statin. effect within a v ery short time level dropped to 4.2. As they like diabetics to be below 4 carreid on trying hard and got as low as 3.2 however had issues with that statin in that my HDL (heart protecting) was below 1! Its not ill you read up on it that you realise that you need this to be above 1.5 or risk heart attack!
Also had real problems with severe muscle weakness in all major muscles, couldnt even push bike up hills I used to ride up-very weird feeling telling legs to push and muscles just not responding.
Tried three months without statins but level instantly went back up to 4.2 so read alot on the internet to do with the various statins and side effects and effect that they have on LDL and HDL as all act differently. Ended up on Rosuvatstin which for me works well (as long as I dont over do the sausage batches or chips) and keeps me around the 2 level for HDL and 1.5-2 for LDL.
I still think that there are some of the other side effects ie poor mmemory that are true but i am willing to put up with that to try and extend my life expectancy and avoid costing the tax payer anymore.
I am gobsmacked by the amount of men my age that stick their head in the sand with cholesterol checks-be warned you could be a walking corpse-get some bottle and get it checked.

+1 rideallday77

Cholesterol level is largely dictated by your genes.
You can eat high cholesterol foods without familial hypercholesteroleamia (high cholesterol thats genetically passed down to you) and be ok.
Cholesterol lowering statins are the most effective way of reducing it.
Don’t listen to scaremongering regarding statins, although some statins don’t suit everyone, there are lots of different ones so there are options.
It is vital that your ‘bad’ cholesterol level is lowered.
Keep up with the healthy lifestyle and keep up with your GP.

36yrs here and had a blood test showing mine was fairly high, dropped the bad stuff (food) lost a load of weight and dropped chol levels to within ‘normal’ range, forgot about it then ate rubbish put it all back on again..currently 3 weeks into sorting out my diet again..its hard as im a hungry boy all of the time!!

good luck!! remember its a fasting blood test too!!

careful diet (just eat healthily)and if still over 5 you might have a propensity to high levels. Is there a history of heart disease in family? then get it to safe levels. Mine was “high” and now is safe levels due to eating sensibily. If you are over weight, it’s possible at some point you were eating faster than your metabolism and are just sustaining it. Don’t eat faster than your own metabolism, get healthy, survive. See you in 100 years :o)

I stumbled on this when following Macavity`s suggestion

http://www.thincs.org/

interesting reading even for a layman like me

Those cholesterol myth websites are very compelling and there does seem to be some intelligent counter-arguments to conventional wisdom.

Particularly interesting is the relationship between saturated fats and effect on cholesterol levels and on health in general.

Of course, for me it’s easier to want to believe these findings because it means I can eat more of the unhealthy things I love. 😉

Another good one: the healthy skeptic

My family has a history of high cholesterol, discovered when my dad had a minor heart attack when he was about 47. He survived but on a bit of digging the high cholesterol was discovered.

That was about 32 years ago. My dad is 79 now.

Our eating habits altered dramatically back then, no butter, only skimmed milk, no fried stuff etc and as we generally ate as a family, we all followed the same low fat diet.

My sister, myself and my brother all have high cholesterol levels but we’re all healthy, active and relatively fit. We don’t stuff meat pies and pizza in our traps like they’re going out of fashion either like the general public assume when you say you have a high cholesterol level. Its a myth.

Now, I’ve lived with this high cholesterol level for years and it is only in the last few years that doctors seem to be making sense to me.

Weight is an issue (with me) so loose it. What you eat, is not as long as you are eating sensibly….in my experience.

I am on statins and something else as I had a record breaking cholesterol level of 16 a few years back even though I am active, fit healthy (ok a bit over weight too but…) eat the right stuff etc etc.

Its now 8 and I’m made up. We seem to have finally found a drug combo that works for me. I’m hoping it will be less next time I go.

That is half the battle and has been for all in my family.

My dads is about 4 now.

Finding out you have a high cholesterol is the first step. Your life doesn’t end when you discover you have one. It took thew doctors years to find the drug combo that worked for me. This is a similar pattern to my dad, sis & brother but we’re all on different stuff but have tried each others at some point if you know what I mean. I was on the same stuff my dad was on after I told my specialist what he was on and it was working for him. It made my level go up!

For years we’ve been told “you can’t eat nuts” then a few years later they tell us ” nuts are great for your cholesterol, eat as many as you can”, the same thing happened with fish and the current thing is oily fish, the more the better… I’m sure it will change at some point again because we were told years ago under no circumstances should we eat oily fish!

Me, I’ve ignored most of that type of advice and eaten sensibly and in moderation.

If you’re concerned, email me. I’ve known about my cholesterol level since the early 80’s and have seen many many doctors and specialists in that time, the majority of whom knew nothing about cholesterol it seemed.

I am happy to say that they do seem to be more aware of it these days though.

There are surely lots of things that contribute to your risk of clogging up and narrowing your arteries and your overall risk is the most important thing. If you have 2 men with a total cholesterol level of 6, if one is 18, normal blood pressure, non smoker, better HDL levels, non diabetic and the other is 60, smoker, high blood pressure, poor HDL profile, then you don’t need to be a Macavity to work out who’s at greatest risk. Secondly, as others have said, your cholesterol level is also influenced by your genes – put 2 people on the same diet and they’ll have different total cholesterol levels. Thirdly, if you already have evidence of narrowing (in that you’ve already had a heart attack or stroke – and I appreciate that doesn’t apply to Chapaking), then the evidence for getting you cholesterol down was, I thought, overwhelming?
So back to our guys who both have a cholesterol of 6. The risk of taking a statin foe Mr 18 year old probably outweighs the benefit in terms of taking it because of his low overall risk. Mr 60 year old with eye popping levels of blood pressure, on the other hand, would possibly be considered a bit of a dumdum if he didn’t. There are lots of ways of calculating the overall risk and some will overestimate risk, others underestimate it. There will be lots of people who fall in the “grey” area. A good doctor should be able to work out your own individual risk and talk you through your options so that you can decide what’s best for you. It sounds like that’s what’s happening. Smoking and things like high blood pressure may be even more dangerous for you than most people if your running higher levels of cholesterol, but you may be able to offset this by keeping your other risk factors under control.
Good luck with you diet and don’t neglect the exercise.

I’ve never had my cholesterol levels measured (47); should I?

Frustrating thing is I got a stinking cold midweek and have had to cancel my planned rides for this week. Was so happy to have an excuse to get out more!

Already the chocolate cravings are subsiding a bit, pleasantly surprised how easy it is to switch back to my old diet. This will be cheaper too! Just made two veg stews and a soup for about £2.

Also cutting back from drinking five nights a week (or more) to just two – so that will probably help.

It’s good to read all your advice and experiences. I appreciate it’s an area where medical understanding is still developing, but I always knew the pies and sausages were wrong for me and I’m happy to follow the recommended diet.

40 yo, had mine tested as part of a research study… quite high: 7.1 along with blood glucose of 6.1. I was a bit worried but the doc said, basically don’t worry: blood pressure is good, not overweight, non-smoker, and he reinforced the above thoughts that diet is only resposible for a small part of the picture. As with everything, it is far more complex than the headlines and adverts make out….