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I was on a low-carb diet for a while. Loved it. Felt great. Was totally fit. All my digestive problems cleared up. I would never get "hangry". By every single s

by vbtemp 6y ago

I was on a low-carb diet for a while. Loved it. Felt great. Was totally fit. All my digestive problems cleared up. I would never get "hangry". By every single subjective measure my quality of life and sense of well-being improved. Then I got my cholesterol checked during a routine blood work and it was through the roof. WTF? Anyone know better than me about this?

huffmsa 6y ago
Had you had it checked before starting the diet?
laser 6y ago
Hmmm iirc, and don’t take this as medical advice and do your own research/consult your doctor, but in states of ketosis in high fat diet, cholesterol rises but primarily in the form of HDL (high-density lipoprotein) while LDL (low-density lipoprotein) level drop. For heart disease, LDL is the concern as it’s floaty and thus gets stuck and accumulates in arteries, while HDL is considered more “good/harmless” as it doesn’t do that.
raincom 6y ago
check ldl-p, ldl-c, and triglycerides. https://cholesterolcode.com/cholesterol-code-part-ii-the-ldl-p-gap/ https://cholesterolcode.com/cholesterol-code-part-ii-the-ldl...
dragonfax 6y ago
The Ketoers say this isn't a problem. That cholestorol is misunderstood, and high values are only bad if you eat high carbs. If your low carb then the high value is actually normal and healthy. But YMMV
- rantwasp 6y ago
  sorry but this is bs and straight dangerous. cholesterol itself is not dangerous but the proteins that carry it in the blood stream are. That’s why LDL is bad and HDL is good (supposedly 2 types of cholesterol- but they’re not they’re two types of proteins). The LDL are the smaller ones that actually end up, in time, piercing the lumen (blood vessel wall) and causing inflammation. this is how your arteries narrow and this is how you eventually end up with heart disease. so the LDL particles (by count not volume) are bad and whoever tells you otherwise is full of crap
  - virtuallynathan 6y ago
    “piercing the lumen” is a drastic over-simplification. We don’t know how much LDL is in a healthy lumen (the small amount of research that exists suggests its greater than the serum concentration). Much of it gets there via active transport mechanisms (transcytosis). Also, why would an endogenously produced protein end up killing you? Seems like evolution run-amok.
    - rantwasp 6y ago
      haha. it’s amazing how complicated even the simplest forms of organic life are. things do go wrong all the time and there are complex mechanisms to balance things out. that being said systematic imbalance or just “wear and tear” eventually win.
- heavyset_go 6y ago
  It's anecdotal evidence, but I know of a fairly young person who is now prescribed statins after overeating animal fat for their keto diet.
  - barrenko 6y ago
    Statins are poison.
NathanKP 6y ago
Yeah a lot of low carb diets replace sugar with super high cholesterol foods. It's not uncommon to hear keto influencers talking about how they can eat as much steak and bacon and cheese as they want.
v37p 6y ago
Anecdotal, but the same happened to me. I later fixed it by running for 30 minutes 3x per week, and continue do to so to this day. LDL, HDL, Triglycerides, and blood pressure are all in the healthy ranges. 5.5 years and counting, with no "cheat" days either.
- jobu 6y ago
  Yep. Exercise is the answer here. Moderate exercise will help your body to produce HDL cholesterol, which aids in removing unhealthy LDL and Triglycerides from your blood stream. According to my doctor, having a higher ratio of HDL to LDL cholesterol is far more important number than the total cholesterol level.
e40 6y ago
High cholesterol does not cause CHD. My PCP doesn't even check it anymore. There is a lot of money behind the drugs that require us to believe this.
- heavyset_go 6y ago
  Show me the clinical evidence that supports your claims, because there are tomes of evidence that suggest the exact opposite. There's a lot of money behind that "One Weird Trick That Doctors Hate and Your Stomach Will Love", too, but not a lot of evidence.
shipman05 6y ago
Low carb doesn't have to mean lots of meat, cheese, and fat. Most people would have positive outcomes from a diet that is 75% whole-food, plant-based no matter what the remaining 25% is.
- ardit33 6y ago
  Plants are mostly carbs yo... well, some have more complex carbs... and some have more fat (avocados) and some have protein, but still "plant based diet" usually means complex carbs... Healthier for sure, but it can't be considered 'low carb diet'
  - gshdg 6y ago
    Not a ton of carb calories in lettuce, kale, spinach, broccoli, etc. They’re mostly composed of insoluble fiber (from which ruminants can extract calories but humans can’t) and water. A “low carb” diet doesn’t exclude high amounts of insoluble fiber. It excludes high amounts of carbohydrate calories.
    - ardit33 6y ago
      This is not getting through... If you are consuming your 2000 calories diet, and it is coming from plants, you are still ingesting 2000 calories worth of carbs..... 1 kg of feathers, and 1 kg of iron, weight the same.... The feathers will be large and take more volume, while the iron will be small and more dense. Same with foods.... if your plant based diet you are consuming 2000 worth of bio-available calories, then that is still mostly carbs... It is healthier for sure than consuming 2000 calories through processed foods such a muffins, chips and other crap. But, still your 2000 CALORIES will come through CARBS, but they will be digested slowly due to the fiber. But if you are ingesting 2000 bio-available calories through plants, it is most likely mostly carbs (plus some fats and protein). Insoluble fiber just goes towards your poop, and it is usually not counted under 'carbs'.
      - heavyset_go 6y ago
enchiridion 6y ago
I've been on the keto diet for a while. Two important pieces of info surround this. 1. Your body is burning more fat so it has to be mobilized in your blood. 2. Blood cholesterol is actually poorly correlated with cardiovascular health. Cholesterol plaques are actually a bandaid for the inflammation caused by a high carb diet. No inflammation no problem. I am not a doc, so do your own research.
jklehm 6y ago
You may be one of the unlucky "responders": https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/nutritionsource/what-should-you-eat/fats-and-cholesterol/cholesterol/ https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/nutritionsource/what-should-you...
- rantwasp 6y ago
  yeah. people don’t really understand that it’s not the cholesterol in food that necessarily matters - most of the cholesterol that circulates in your blood is actually produced by your liver. also, there are different phenotypes when it comes to cholesterol. For some a LFHC diet does wonders, for others it’s a sure way to have problems down the line if you sustain it for long periods of time.
PKop 6y ago
Your assumptions about high cholesterol being bad are wrong, simple as that. Just as a few decades ago, the popular (even as agreed upon within medical industry) assumptions about "low fat" were wrong. In other words, the measurement you observed was good. Your brain needs that measured value you were tested at to be high. Your health would suffer if it wasn't. There is tons of research and discussion about this online. The argument goes along with the idea that "statins" are one of the biggest pharmaceutical scams in history, bad for brain health and part of a larger false narrative on cholesterol. Don't change a thing, you're doing it right.
- rantwasp 6y ago
  so. this is so general that it’s not helpful. what ranges are we talking about? also, when people talk about cholesterol they usually don’t mean cholesterol they mean lipi-proteins that carry the cholesterol through the blood (cholesterol needs this as it’s hydrophobic). LDL from those lipo-proteins is definitely correlated with heart disease. Here, read about it in more detail than you probably need to know: https://peterattiamd.com/the-straight-dope-on-cholesterol-part-i/ https://peterattiamd.com/the-straight-dope-on-cholesterol-pa...
  - KerryJones 6y ago
    LDL is correlated but not causative and it's been discovered that HDL is a much better indicator. Take a look at this book: https://www.amazon.com/Big-Fat-Surprise-Butter-Healthy/dp/1451624433/ https://www.amazon.com/Big-Fat-Surprise-Butter-Healthy/dp/14... It goes into it quite a bit more -- cholesterol is a _terrible_ indicator of overall health. This is well known in the Keto community.
    - rantwasp 6y ago
      when you use LDL, HDL and cholesterol interchangeably this tells me that you don’t know what you’re talking about. Cholesterol itself is part of the lipid membrane of every cell. It’s essential. When people say “high cholesterol” they usually talk about high cholesterol carrying lipo-proteins in the bloodstream. high ldl is definitely a risk factor for CHD
capkutay 6y ago
If your definition of 'low-carb diet' includes red meat, cheese, and butter then high cholesterol shouldn't surprise you at all. People should really look at minimizing their intake of animal fats. Both for ethical and health reasons.
- halfcat 6y ago
  > People should really look at minimizing their intake of animal fats. Both for ethical and health reasons. I’m all for the ethical angle. Factory farming is horrific. But why health? I certainly haven’t read every study out there, but I’ve read a lot of studies, and what I can’t find is causal evidence of negative health effects of animal products in the absence of sugar. Do you know of any studies I can read?
jadell 6y ago
I'm glad you found a diet that works for you, makes you feel healthier, and has improved you QoL. But it's not a panacea, and it's certainly not a cure for type 1 diabetes.
- NotHereNotThere 6y ago
  He never mentioned it being a cure to T1D..
  - jadell 6y ago
    The response is to an article about low carb diets sending diabetes patients into "remission". It's hard not to make the connection.
    - NotHereNotThere 6y ago
      Well.. I don't actually think the article claims a 'cure' either. If I get cancer, have treatment for it and am now in remission, who would think these doctors 'cured' cancer? Everyone would understand _my specific instance_ of cancer is reduced to being not a concern anymore. Being in remission just means a greatly reduced or almost inexistent dependency on insulin. I'm not saying the conclusions of the article are correct either (low sample size, short period of time), but it's a far cry from claiming 'LCHF cures T1D'
heavyset_go 6y ago
I'm someone with a family history of CVD, so the only way I would try a low-carb diet is if I ate food that doesn't have clinical evidence for raising cholesterol, blood pressure, etc. That meant eating only a small amount of saturated fat, and limiting palmitic acid in particular, and only small amounts of table salt balanced with other minerals like potassium chloride. I'd eat a lot of salad, nuts, fish, and the only additional fat I'd eat would be in form of EVOO, avocado oil or other oils high in monounsaturated fats, and some polyunsaturated fats. My blood work was always fine. Some people think low-carb means that they get to eat bacon for every meal and drink the grease.
- treeman79 6y ago
  Sounds like your following an AIP diet. Fantastic for dealing with inflammation.
KerryJones 6y ago
As many have said -- cholesterol is not indicative of much, HDL can be useful but still not much. First thing I would do is study a little bit about it, I found this book very informative, The Big Fat Surprise https://www.amazon.com/Big-Fat-Surprise-Butter-Healthy/dp/1451624433/ https://www.amazon.com/Big-Fat-Surprise-Butter-Healthy/dp/14... I've been Keto for 18 months and it's changed my life (I've previous tried Paleo, Vegan, Vegetarian, Pescetarian, and a few others) -- I also got my blood tested 6 months after starting and I was in "perfect" levels according to the nurse -- but cholesterol specificaly is a terrible indicator.
Daynil 6y ago
There is an incredible amount of confusion surrounding cholesterol, mostly because of the incredible amount of bad/old/incomplete science around which many major medical associations base their recommendations. To put it simply, using "cholesterol" as an indicator for anything is a completely oversimplified view originating in the 50s, when we didn't know enough molecular biology to know better. We've since moved on to breaking out LDL (bad) and HDL (good) cholesterol. However, as it turns out even that is too simplistic. There are further sub-classifications of LDL, such as large fluffy LDL and small dense LDL. If subclasifying LDL - Low-Density Lipoprotein - as "small and dense" seems counterintuitive, I agree. I feel like it's a result of the order in which we learned about all the forms of cholesterol, and a reflection of how complex the system is, and perhaps how much more we have left to fully understand it. As it turns out, so many of the perils of what we thought was caused by "high cholesterol", and then "high LDL/bad cholesterol" seem to be most strongly correlated with the small/dense LDL pattern. The irony is, we've been measuring everything but the main culprits, gaining an incomplete picture of what's actually going on, then ended up with wildly ineffective or harmful dietary recommendations as a result. A low fat high carb diet may reduce your cholesterol, but it can wreak havoc in so many other ways. Bottom line is, eating a low carb, high fat diet increases all of your cholesterol (subject to individual variation), but seems to exert favorable effects on the overall ratio of the individual particles, which may be the important thing. If you're really interested in what's going on with your cholesterol, ask for a LDL particle size test, then you may be able to draw some more meaningful inferences. [1] To me, it's a good hint that if every physical and mental aspect of your body improved on a diet, it's unlikely a bad thing. Best to discuss these things with your doctor though. Diet science is still a frustratingly murky field, so it's pretty hard to navigate right now. If you want to understand why, I highly recommend Good Calories, Bad Calories by Gary Taubes. [1] http://education.questdiagnostics.com/faq/FAQ134 http://education.questdiagnostics.com/faq/FAQ134
- rantwasp 6y ago
  totally. looking at LDL-P is a better indicator that looking at “cholesterol”. There are cases where LDL-C looks okay but you have a large number of particles or cases with elevated LDL-C but with normal number of particles.
halfcat 6y ago
> Then I got my cholesterol checked during a routine blood work and it was through the roof. WTF? Anyone know better than me about this? This is not necessarily a bad sign, but you should talk to your doctor about getting more advanced cholesterol blood tests. There are different measures of cholesterol, like concentration per particle, number of particles, and size of particles, and regular bloodwork usually only measures one of those (concentration, I believe). You can have a lot of small, empty particles, or fewer large, dense particles, and so forth. This means a regular test may not paint the whole picture, especially if you’re doing something “non-standard” like a keto diet, fasting, or if you’re losing significant body fat.
throwaway_USD 6y ago
>Then I got my cholesterol checked during a routine blood work and it was through the roof. WTF? Anyone know better than me about this? Your LDL(bad), HDL (good) or both? And did your doctor do a coronary scan (checking for plaque build up)? What you don't want is LDL Cholesterol building up as plaque in the arteries, there is some connection to plaque build up and LDL levels. High HDL cholesterol is associated with low risk of heart disease. Typically a LCHF diet raises HDL (i.e. lower risk of plaque build up and heart disease). In some people LCHF diets raise both LDL and HDL, but the ratios are typically and overall improvement (meaning less plaque build up). The goal with health isn't low cholesterol necessarily, its low plaque buildup.

by vbtemp 6y ago

huffmsa 6y ago

Had you had it checked before starting the diet?

laser 6y ago

Hmmm iirc, and don’t take this as medical advice and do your own research/consult your doctor, but in states of ketosis in high fat diet, cholesterol rises but primarily in the form of HDL (high-density lipoprotein) while LDL (low-density lipoprotein) level drop. For heart disease, LDL is the concern as it’s floaty and thus gets stuck and accumulates in arteries, while HDL is considered more “good/harmless” as it doesn’t do that.

raincom 6y ago

check ldl-p, ldl-c, and triglycerides. https://cholesterolcode.com/cholesterol-code-part-ii-the-ldl-p-gap/ https://cholesterolcode.com/cholesterol-code-part-ii-the-ldl...

dragonfax 6y ago

The Ketoers say this isn't a problem. That cholestorol is misunderstood, and high values are only bad if you eat high carbs. If your low carb then the high value is actually normal and healthy. But YMMV

rantwasp 6y ago
sorry but this is bs and straight dangerous. cholesterol itself is not dangerous but the proteins that carry it in the blood stream are. That’s why LDL is bad and HDL is good (supposedly 2 types of cholesterol- but they’re not they’re two types of proteins). The LDL are the smaller ones that actually end up, in time, piercing the lumen (blood vessel wall) and causing inflammation. this is how your arteries narrow and this is how you eventually end up with heart disease. so the LDL particles (by count not volume) are bad and whoever tells you otherwise is full of crap
- virtuallynathan 6y ago
  “piercing the lumen” is a drastic over-simplification. We don’t know how much LDL is in a healthy lumen (the small amount of research that exists suggests its greater than the serum concentration). Much of it gets there via active transport mechanisms (transcytosis). Also, why would an endogenously produced protein end up killing you? Seems like evolution run-amok.
  - rantwasp 6y ago
    haha. it’s amazing how complicated even the simplest forms of organic life are. things do go wrong all the time and there are complex mechanisms to balance things out. that being said systematic imbalance or just “wear and tear” eventually win.
heavyset_go 6y ago
It's anecdotal evidence, but I know of a fairly young person who is now prescribed statins after overeating animal fat for their keto diet.
- barrenko 6y ago
  Statins are poison.

NathanKP 6y ago

Yeah a lot of low carb diets replace sugar with super high cholesterol foods. It's not uncommon to hear keto influencers talking about how they can eat as much steak and bacon and cheese as they want.

v37p 6y ago

Anecdotal, but the same happened to me. I later fixed it by running for 30 minutes 3x per week, and continue do to so to this day. LDL, HDL, Triglycerides, and blood pressure are all in the healthy ranges. 5.5 years and counting, with no "cheat" days either.

jobu 6y ago
Yep. Exercise is the answer here. Moderate exercise will help your body to produce HDL cholesterol, which aids in removing unhealthy LDL and Triglycerides from your blood stream. According to my doctor, having a higher ratio of HDL to LDL cholesterol is far more important number than the total cholesterol level.

e40 6y ago

High cholesterol does not cause CHD. My PCP doesn't even check it anymore. There is a lot of money behind the drugs that require us to believe this.

heavyset_go 6y ago
Show me the clinical evidence that supports your claims, because there are tomes of evidence that suggest the exact opposite. There's a lot of money behind that "One Weird Trick That Doctors Hate and Your Stomach Will Love", too, but not a lot of evidence.

shipman05 6y ago

Low carb doesn't have to mean lots of meat, cheese, and fat. Most people would have positive outcomes from a diet that is 75% whole-food, plant-based no matter what the remaining 25% is.

ardit33 6y ago
Plants are mostly carbs yo... well, some have more complex carbs... and some have more fat (avocados) and some have protein, but still "plant based diet" usually means complex carbs... Healthier for sure, but it can't be considered 'low carb diet'
- gshdg 6y ago
  Not a ton of carb calories in lettuce, kale, spinach, broccoli, etc. They’re mostly composed of insoluble fiber (from which ruminants can extract calories but humans can’t) and water. A “low carb” diet doesn’t exclude high amounts of insoluble fiber. It excludes high amounts of carbohydrate calories.
  - ardit33 6y ago
    This is not getting through... If you are consuming your 2000 calories diet, and it is coming from plants, you are still ingesting 2000 calories worth of carbs..... 1 kg of feathers, and 1 kg of iron, weight the same.... The feathers will be large and take more volume, while the iron will be small and more dense. Same with foods.... if your plant based diet you are consuming 2000 worth of bio-available calories, then that is still mostly carbs... It is healthier for sure than consuming 2000 calories through processed foods such a muffins, chips and other crap. But, still your 2000 CALORIES will come through CARBS, but they will be digested slowly due to the fiber. But if you are ingesting 2000 bio-available calories through plants, it is most likely mostly carbs (plus some fats and protein). Insoluble fiber just goes towards your poop, and it is usually not counted under 'carbs'.
    - heavyset_go 6y ago

enchiridion 6y ago

I've been on the keto diet for a while. Two important pieces of info surround this. 1. Your body is burning more fat so it has to be mobilized in your blood. 2. Blood cholesterol is actually poorly correlated with cardiovascular health. Cholesterol plaques are actually a bandaid for the inflammation caused by a high carb diet. No inflammation no problem. I am not a doc, so do your own research.

jklehm 6y ago

You may be one of the unlucky "responders": https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/nutritionsource/what-should-you-eat/fats-and-cholesterol/cholesterol/ https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/nutritionsource/what-should-you...

rantwasp 6y ago
yeah. people don’t really understand that it’s not the cholesterol in food that necessarily matters - most of the cholesterol that circulates in your blood is actually produced by your liver. also, there are different phenotypes when it comes to cholesterol. For some a LFHC diet does wonders, for others it’s a sure way to have problems down the line if you sustain it for long periods of time.

PKop 6y ago

Your assumptions about high cholesterol being bad are wrong, simple as that. Just as a few decades ago, the popular (even as agreed upon within medical industry) assumptions about "low fat" were wrong. In other words, the measurement you observed was good. Your brain needs that measured value you were tested at to be high. Your health would suffer if it wasn't. There is tons of research and discussion about this online. The argument goes along with the idea that "statins" are one of the biggest pharmaceutical scams in history, bad for brain health and part of a larger false narrative on cholesterol. Don't change a thing, you're doing it right.

rantwasp 6y ago
so. this is so general that it’s not helpful. what ranges are we talking about? also, when people talk about cholesterol they usually don’t mean cholesterol they mean lipi-proteins that carry the cholesterol through the blood (cholesterol needs this as it’s hydrophobic). LDL from those lipo-proteins is definitely correlated with heart disease. Here, read about it in more detail than you probably need to know: https://peterattiamd.com/the-straight-dope-on-cholesterol-part-i/ https://peterattiamd.com/the-straight-dope-on-cholesterol-pa...
- KerryJones 6y ago
  LDL is correlated but not causative and it's been discovered that HDL is a much better indicator. Take a look at this book: https://www.amazon.com/Big-Fat-Surprise-Butter-Healthy/dp/1451624433/ https://www.amazon.com/Big-Fat-Surprise-Butter-Healthy/dp/14... It goes into it quite a bit more -- cholesterol is a _terrible_ indicator of overall health. This is well known in the Keto community.
  - rantwasp 6y ago
    when you use LDL, HDL and cholesterol interchangeably this tells me that you don’t know what you’re talking about. Cholesterol itself is part of the lipid membrane of every cell. It’s essential. When people say “high cholesterol” they usually talk about high cholesterol carrying lipo-proteins in the bloodstream. high ldl is definitely a risk factor for CHD

capkutay 6y ago

If your definition of 'low-carb diet' includes red meat, cheese, and butter then high cholesterol shouldn't surprise you at all. People should really look at minimizing their intake of animal fats. Both for ethical and health reasons.

halfcat 6y ago
> People should really look at minimizing their intake of animal fats. Both for ethical and health reasons. I’m all for the ethical angle. Factory farming is horrific. But why health? I certainly haven’t read every study out there, but I’ve read a lot of studies, and what I can’t find is causal evidence of negative health effects of animal products in the absence of sugar. Do you know of any studies I can read?

jadell 6y ago

I'm glad you found a diet that works for you, makes you feel healthier, and has improved you QoL. But it's not a panacea, and it's certainly not a cure for type 1 diabetes.

NotHereNotThere 6y ago
He never mentioned it being a cure to T1D..
- jadell 6y ago
  The response is to an article about low carb diets sending diabetes patients into "remission". It's hard not to make the connection.
  - NotHereNotThere 6y ago
    Well.. I don't actually think the article claims a 'cure' either. If I get cancer, have treatment for it and am now in remission, who would think these doctors 'cured' cancer? Everyone would understand _my specific instance_ of cancer is reduced to being not a concern anymore. Being in remission just means a greatly reduced or almost inexistent dependency on insulin. I'm not saying the conclusions of the article are correct either (low sample size, short period of time), but it's a far cry from claiming 'LCHF cures T1D'

heavyset_go 6y ago

I'm someone with a family history of CVD, so the only way I would try a low-carb diet is if I ate food that doesn't have clinical evidence for raising cholesterol, blood pressure, etc. That meant eating only a small amount of saturated fat, and limiting palmitic acid in particular, and only small amounts of table salt balanced with other minerals like potassium chloride. I'd eat a lot of salad, nuts, fish, and the only additional fat I'd eat would be in form of EVOO, avocado oil or other oils high in monounsaturated fats, and some polyunsaturated fats. My blood work was always fine. Some people think low-carb means that they get to eat bacon for every meal and drink the grease.

treeman79 6y ago
Sounds like your following an AIP diet. Fantastic for dealing with inflammation.

KerryJones 6y ago

As many have said -- cholesterol is not indicative of much, HDL can be useful but still not much. First thing I would do is study a little bit about it, I found this book very informative, The Big Fat Surprise https://www.amazon.com/Big-Fat-Surprise-Butter-Healthy/dp/1451624433/ https://www.amazon.com/Big-Fat-Surprise-Butter-Healthy/dp/14... I've been Keto for 18 months and it's changed my life (I've previous tried Paleo, Vegan, Vegetarian, Pescetarian, and a few others) -- I also got my blood tested 6 months after starting and I was in "perfect" levels according to the nurse -- but cholesterol specificaly is a terrible indicator.

Daynil 6y ago

There is an incredible amount of confusion surrounding cholesterol, mostly because of the incredible amount of bad/old/incomplete science around which many major medical associations base their recommendations. To put it simply, using "cholesterol" as an indicator for anything is a completely oversimplified view originating in the 50s, when we didn't know enough molecular biology to know better. We've since moved on to breaking out LDL (bad) and HDL (good) cholesterol. However, as it turns out even that is too simplistic. There are further sub-classifications of LDL, such as large fluffy LDL and small dense LDL. If subclasifying LDL - Low-Density Lipoprotein - as "small and dense" seems counterintuitive, I agree. I feel like it's a result of the order in which we learned about all the forms of cholesterol, and a reflection of how complex the system is, and perhaps how much more we have left to fully understand it. As it turns out, so many of the perils of what we thought was caused by "high cholesterol", and then "high LDL/bad cholesterol" seem to be most strongly correlated with the small/dense LDL pattern. The irony is, we've been measuring everything but the main culprits, gaining an incomplete picture of what's actually going on, then ended up with wildly ineffective or harmful dietary recommendations as a result. A low fat high carb diet may reduce your cholesterol, but it can wreak havoc in so many other ways. Bottom line is, eating a low carb, high fat diet increases all of your cholesterol (subject to individual variation), but seems to exert favorable effects on the overall ratio of the individual particles, which may be the important thing. If you're really interested in what's going on with your cholesterol, ask for a LDL particle size test, then you may be able to draw some more meaningful inferences. [1] To me, it's a good hint that if every physical and mental aspect of your body improved on a diet, it's unlikely a bad thing. Best to discuss these things with your doctor though. Diet science is still a frustratingly murky field, so it's pretty hard to navigate right now. If you want to understand why, I highly recommend Good Calories, Bad Calories by Gary Taubes. [1] http://education.questdiagnostics.com/faq/FAQ134 http://education.questdiagnostics.com/faq/FAQ134

rantwasp 6y ago
totally. looking at LDL-P is a better indicator that looking at “cholesterol”. There are cases where LDL-C looks okay but you have a large number of particles or cases with elevated LDL-C but with normal number of particles.

halfcat 6y ago

> Then I got my cholesterol checked during a routine blood work and it was through the roof. WTF? Anyone know better than me about this? This is not necessarily a bad sign, but you should talk to your doctor about getting more advanced cholesterol blood tests. There are different measures of cholesterol, like concentration per particle, number of particles, and size of particles, and regular bloodwork usually only measures one of those (concentration, I believe). You can have a lot of small, empty particles, or fewer large, dense particles, and so forth. This means a regular test may not paint the whole picture, especially if you’re doing something “non-standard” like a keto diet, fasting, or if you’re losing significant body fat.

throwaway_USD 6y ago

>Then I got my cholesterol checked during a routine blood work and it was through the roof. WTF? Anyone know better than me about this? Your LDL(bad), HDL (good) or both? And did your doctor do a coronary scan (checking for plaque build up)? What you don't want is LDL Cholesterol building up as plaque in the arteries, there is some connection to plaque build up and LDL levels. High HDL cholesterol is associated with low risk of heart disease. Typically a LCHF diet raises HDL (i.e. lower risk of plaque build up and heart disease). In some people LCHF diets raise both LDL and HDL, but the ratios are typically and overall improvement (meaning less plaque build up). The goal with health isn't low cholesterol necessarily, its low plaque buildup.