If you could choose...

[skyhawk]

If you could hand pick your cholesterol numbers, what number would YOU pick?

I'll go first. I would choose a total cholesterol of 225, and an HDL of.. Hmm..62.

[Karole]

I choose : Total Cholesterol 199
Triglycerides 54
LDl 100
Hdl 74
c/hdl ratio 2.69
ldl/hdl ratio 1.35

( which by the way was my last lipid panel test results :D:D)

[skyhawk]

Karole, I am impressed with your low triglycerides. I have begun to choose low carb foods. I have learned that I love bokChoy. Still learning the low carb choices as I slowly educate myself.

[Karole]

A while back (before I knew about low carb) my triglycerides were over 350 !! My doc objected to that and I asked him how do I lower it-- he didn't say go low carb but he did say "quit eating pie". At least he connected it to sugar and carbs !!!

[skyhawk]

Wow! Trigs came down from 350 to 50 with low carb? I find that very interesting.

As I look at food, I never realized just how much food is made with enriched flour. Crackers, dounuts, fried food coatings, you name it. Then added sugar is in just about everything thats processed, usually in the form of HFCS.

It seems that the primary ingredients people consume from processed foods are;

Enriched flour, High frictose corn suyrup, Partially hydrogenated oils, Modified food starch, artificial flavor, artificial color.

There! That really describes the majority of processed stuff on the grocery store shelf. They just change the shape and flavor and the graphics on the box. But with some variations, you can take those basic ingredients and make just about anything you want.

Cookies
Crackers
Gold fish
Bread
batter
Cake mixes
Muffins
.....and the list goes on and on and on.

Skyhawk

[maxlharris]

I don't know that I worry about my cholesterol to have a set of numbers that I "wish" for. I like my ratios to stay clean. That basically means high HDL wrt everything else. My trigs are in the 50s, and are reasonably well controlled even when I am off plan (I had 150 as a baseline, dropped to 74 then 51). My LDL goes up when I'm off plan. Which messes with ratios, but it never goes up to where I worry about it. Doc is another issue, but I don't.