Cholesterol went down after 3 months of high fat diet

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alim24
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Location: California

Cholesterol went down after 3 months of high fat diet

Post by alim24 »

Hi there!

I'm new here. I started having WD when I was a junior (~age 16) in high school and it never went away (am now 32). I've gone through courses of budesonide, my drug of choice, but am too young to be on a steroid for the rest of my life I feel. I'd like to handle this as naturally as possible. For the past 3 months I've been pretty much AIP/paleo (no caffeine -- even decaf, no grains, no added sugars, no wheat, no dairy, no nightshades, no alcohol). I have been eating high fat meats daily, including sugar-free bacon almost daily.

What's strange is my high cholesterol actually dropped somewhat significantly. I was always told I likely had genetically high cholesterol since it runs in my family even though I'm somewhat fit / have always eaten healthily. And everywhere I read about high animal fat diet, it says your cholesterol will go up. I'm curious if this has that happened to anyone else. Does anyone have any theories as to why mine dropped?

LDL went from 221 to 161, HDL from 44 to 51, total from 276 to 223.
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tex
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Re: Cholesterol went down after 3 months of high fat diet

Post by tex »

Hi,

Welcome to the group. You didn't tell us whether your MC is in remission, but I assume that it is, since You didn't state otherwise, either. As for using a high-fat diet to lower cholesterol, sure I can cite medical research that proves that phenomenon. And doctors should be well aware of this, since it was published in 1998, but since it disproves what they've been preaching for too many decades, they continue to ignore this research. Apparently they would rather continue to mistreat patients, than to admit that they've been totally wrong (and completely bass-ackwards) with their recommendations. And because of the bias so prevalent in the medical community, researchers no longer choose to do any more research to prove the advantages of a high-fat diet, either. Here's a link to the research:

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/3336803/

You should be proud of your accomplishments. They prove that you are smarter than at least 99.9% of the doctors in this country.

Again, welcome to the board.

Tex
:cowboy:

It is suspected that some of the hardest material known to science can be found in the skulls of GI specialists who insist that diet has nothing to do with the treatment of microscopic colitis.
Marcia K
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Re: Cholesterol went down after 3 months of high fat diet

Post by Marcia K »

HI, alim24 & welcome to our group! This is encouraging as my PCC is hinting around about taking a statin. I have a genetic predisposition to high cholesterol and the number has been creeping up. I'm trying to lower it through exercise & cutting back on my potato chip consumption. I'm due for my annual bloodwork so time will tell!
Marcia
------------
My mission in life is not merely to survive, but to thrive and to do so with some passion, some compassion, some humor and some style. - M. Angelou
alim24
Posts: 21
Joined: Tue Mar 28, 2023 10:27 pm
Location: California

Re: Cholesterol went down after 3 months of high fat diet

Post by alim24 »

Thank you Tex and Marcia :grin:

I have not reached remission unfortunately, I'm just trying different diets to see if I can get to the bottom of my triggers, and in the meantime I seem to have dropped my Cholesterol. My Enterolab kit just arrived yesterday and I will try to send in on Monday or Tuesday. While I do love my GI doc, and my best friend's dad who is also a GI doc I speak with, both have told me diet has nothing to do with it, and if it did, I would have figured it out by now :???: .

I'm excited to be part of this board now, as I have been lurking for quite some time, and I'm glad I finally dove in.

- Ali
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tex
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Re: Cholesterol went down after 3 months of high fat diet

Post by tex »

Ali,

Once you receive your Enterolab results, you should know exactly which food problems are remaining in your diet. Unfortunately, one of the reasons why GI docs don't realize how big an effect diet has on the control of MC is because they don't recognize the value of the Enterolab tests. While naturopaths tend to use the Enterolab.testing, MDs don't, because sadly, they don't officially recognize the validity of the tests, despite the fact that there are the most accurate food sensitivity tests in the world. But then, gastroenterologist, and MDs in general, don't understand food sensitivities, anyway, because they're not adequately trained in med school.

Tex
:cowboy:

It is suspected that some of the hardest material known to science can be found in the skulls of GI specialists who insist that diet has nothing to do with the treatment of microscopic colitis.
alim24
Posts: 21
Joined: Tue Mar 28, 2023 10:27 pm
Location: California

Re: Cholesterol went down after 3 months of high fat diet

Post by alim24 »

Thanks Tex. I sent my labs in yesterday (bless the poor souls at UPS and Enterolabs who have to confront my package), and I'm so excited to get the results. I have a hard time imagining how it will be "fresh" by the time it gets to TX, but I'll leave that to the experts lol.

I wanted to follow up on this cholesterol topic. I told my doctor what diet I had been on when she asked how I lowered my cholesterol and I said lots of animal meat/fat, no grains, no soy, no gluten, no dairy, no added sugar. She sneakily re-ordered cholesterol tests and when I took it a few weeks later it was back up. She then asked me what I did differently, adding "did ya eat too many fatty foods this time? please eat healthy." I'm still fuming at the condescension. Literally the only thing I did differently was add rice back in daily. I personally suspect the rice. Everything else stayed the same.

What do you guys think?
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tex
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Re: Cholesterol went down after 3 months of high fat diet

Post by tex »

Your suspicion of rice is right on target. Carbohydrates are our main source of cholesterol, and grains are the worst. Her behavior verifies her ignorance of the sources of cholesterol.

Tex
:cowboy:

It is suspected that some of the hardest material known to science can be found in the skulls of GI specialists who insist that diet has nothing to do with the treatment of microscopic colitis.
Marcia K
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Re: Cholesterol went down after 3 months of high fat diet

Post by Marcia K »

We haven't gone to med school, but we have a lot of knowledge on many things related to our health!!
Marcia
------------
My mission in life is not merely to survive, but to thrive and to do so with some passion, some compassion, some humor and some style. - M. Angelou
alim24
Posts: 21
Joined: Tue Mar 28, 2023 10:27 pm
Location: California

Re: Cholesterol went down after 3 months of high fat diet

Post by alim24 »

Forgot to add that I also had reintroduced coffee/dairy for the first time in 3 months as well.

Anyway, yes, it's funny or maybe sad that I trust this group far more than I trust doctors these days. This disease seems to be a classic example of something you need to take into your own hands. I'm glad this forum exists for all of us though!
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