help...raised cholesterol!

[hobotnica]

I need major help. After strictly low-carbing (no cheating and also measuring carefully) for close to 2 months, I went and had my blood tests done. My cholesterol which was already high at 6.2 total, jumped in this short time to 8.1 (6.00 LDL) I almost fainted on the carpet at the doctor's office. I have an appointment to see the doctor in 3 weeks, and I just don't know what to do.
I've read EVERY book on earth regarding low carbing and I thought it all made very good sense. I noticed though that none of the books talks about those few people who do not benefit from this way of life...and I am unable to find more information on why this might be.
Note, while low-carbing the last few weeks...I lost absolutely no weight...felt very tired and weak all the time, couldn't sleep, and my ketones were negative to trace at best.
Does anyone know where I can find out more???
Thanks for any help you can offer

[bluugirl]

it might be a good idea to start a journal and post what you've been eating.. did you also gain weight, or is your weight the same , u just didn't lose anything? I am sure u are doing something 'wrong' rather than saying you're one of those rare people where LCing doesn't work for.. I believe Atkins said EVERYONE will lose in induction even very resistant people will lose something, even though it may not be alot.

However it's possible you might need to restrict calories as well as carbs for those who aren't losing...Perhaps you're on medication etc etc...

At any rate, a journal may be a good place to start, there are some very knowledgeable, very experienced LCers here.

[detoura1a]

My numbers went up too. I think mine is an issue of hereditary. My entire family has high numbers. I was put on lipitor. I hate to take it, but as long as I've been on atkins, my numbers continue to climb (even on lipitor). I think I will have to go off of atkins. I have reached my goal weight, but even on maintenance, the numbers continue to rise. I lost a total of 44 pounds. Now I have to get my cholesterol under control and try a low calorie and very low fat diet. Hope you have better results than I did with lowering the cholesterol. Most people do better.
ronda

[tamarian]

Keep in mind that some people might be better off on high-protein, low-fat plans. I think it is genetic.

Wa'il

[bluugirl]

aah..

[tamarian]

But a journal definitly helps. We've heard from a few members who did well on low-fat hight-protein.

But not losing weight only in the last week is normal. We all go through a cycle of weight-loss, plateau, back and forth. Almost everyone does, and it can last several weeks.

Keeping a journal can help you:

1. Remember what you ate a few weeks ago that worked
2. Detect changes that didn't work
3. Keep track of weight and measurements
4 Detect your cycles for plateaus(x?), if it occures every 6,7 or 8 weeks, and how long they last.

Wa'il

[Tonsil]

First of all, in response to bluuugirl's reply, Dr Atkins does NOT say that all will lose weight from low-carb dieting.

New Diet Revolution, pg 21:

"I'm not about to fall into the error of the low-fat dieting devotees who claim that their diet works for everyone. I would feel rather foolish if I did. No diet works for everyone. Human biological individuality is very marked."

He does go on to say that it does work for most people, of course.

But I didn't see you mention exercise. If you're on the induction diet and you're not regularly exercising, you may feel tired through the day and actually reduce your activity level. This can have a profound effect on serum chloresterol, regardless of your diet.

A second caveat I would forward is to be leery of going to low-carb, low-fat WOE. I know of one person who went on such a diet and his cholesterol skyrocketed. Our conversation went something like this:

"I tried low-carb eating, and my cholesterol went from 220 to 260 [US numbers, normal is 130-200]"
[Me] "Were you consuming fat?"
"No, it was a protein diet."
[Me] "Well, if you don't consume enough dietary cholesterol, your body will produce its own, and if you consume zero cholesterol, your body will overcompensate. Consuming too little cholesterol can be just as dangerous as consuming too much."

He had been unaware of this.

Another thing to look at is supplements that lower serum cholesterol naturally. Also from Atkins' book (pg 210):

"For the lowering or prevention of cholesterol elevations, I use lecithin granules, chromium, pantethine, niacin and other B complex factors, garlic, vitamin C, GLA (borage, primrose, or black-currant oils), EPA (fish oil), beta-sitosterol, glucomannan, guar gum, pectin, psyllium husks, dimethyl glycine, CoQ10, phosphanatidyl choline, or I use the Vita-Nutrient 'Cholesterol' formula plus the Essential Oils Formula".

All that having been said, you may be of the genetic type that responds better to a fat-restricted diet. But I wouldn't go down that road except as a last resort, because you have to count calories and really restrict your food intake to make it work.

Good Luck!

[tamarian]

Hey Tonsil, welcome aboard. Glad you jumped in.

Wa'il

[hobotnica]

Hi,

Thanks for responding to my message. First off, I'm not against low carbing...I think it is the one eating plan that makes lots of sense and I found it extremely easy to stay on it. I never craved sugar, and never felt the need to cheat. I do keep food journals, and I was doing everything by the book (my husband was on the same program and lost almost 20 pounds in the first 4 weeks and felt really strong and healthy.) I wanted to talk to others who may be experiencing a similar situation as mine (higher cholesterol) to figure out if perhaps something is metabolically not quite working in my system. I'm also interested in any other strange or weird medical phenomena they might have experienced in their lives that might be related: eg. strong reactions to certain medications, allergies, food intolerances (I can't eat pasta), blood type (I'm AB+), weight loss successes or failures, thyroid levels, etc.

I know that there are others out there like myself. Even if we only represent a tiny portion of the population...that could still mean that there are hundreds or even thousands of us out there. Collectively, we must have information that we can pool together so that we can also have an eating plan to follow. It is so disheartening time and time again to be told that this program works for almost everyone...but not you.

I am not on any medications and as far as I know I am healthy. Diabetes does run in my family, although I have tested negative, and several family members have died of massive heart attacks due to atherosclerosis (including my father who died last year and put me on this quest to get my own cholesterol down.)

I have been researching low carb eating to lower my cholesterol more than anything. You can see why my extremely high test results are making me very nervous.

Thanks again for your input. I'll keep visiting this site for all the very useful information. If you hear about anybody (your hairdresser's cousin's mailman's neighbour) who had a smiliar experience to mine, I'd love to hear about it. This is a mystery that I must solve....one way or another.

[bluugirl]

Hi hobotnica,
have you thought of trying a vegeterian version of LCing? I think it can be done although probably it's a little hard. I think there are some members here who do that. Or perhaps substituting red meat with white meat etc... also have u tried cutting down on butter, and using more olive oil.. olive oil is really very heart healthy, or cutting down on cheeses..
just an idea.

[doreen T]

In the absence of any other symptoms of heart & blood vessel disease, a high cholesterol reading is not by itself indicative of pathology or risk. I think that the Fear of Cholesterol has been too successfully ground into our brains by the media, promoted by those who stand to profit most from that fear, such as pharmaceutical giants and processed "lowfat" foods manufacturers .. :mad:

As I'm sure you know from your research and reading, cholesterol is a vital chemical, necessary for many functions in the human body. There are two ways we can obtain cholesterol -- from the food we eat, or the liver will make cholesterol if none is received from the diet. And it's well-known and documented that the cholesterol we MAKE functions quite differently from the cholesterol we EAT. It's described best by one of our members, a biochemist, himself a heart attack and quadruple bypass survivor, who got worse on the standard lowfat/low cholesterol diet and anti-cholesterol DRUGS, and improved and stayed improved by quitting the medications and following Atkins to the letter, including intentionally eating a lot of fatOriginally posted by kentid2k
..... How is it possible to eat all those (fat) foods, (some of them chock full of cholesterol) and maintain an acceptable level of cholesterol and triglycerides ? How is it possible to lose weight when you consume all those fats and calories ?

When you starve your body of dietary cholesterol, your body takes over and produces its own. In many individuals, the body is very ineffecient at producing cholesterol. In my case, it produced it at an uncontollable level and very little HDL. A very dangerous situation for someone with my medical history and genetics. By consuming as much cholesterol as the body needs in your diet, the body no longer needs to produce any of its own, and is much more effecient at removing the dietary cholesterol from your system. By introducing higher levels of poly and mono-unsturated fats, ( i.e. - Virgin cold pressed Olive oil and good quality Canola oil etc. ) you also help to increase your levels of HDL ( the "good" cholesterol )That entire thread is very informative and interesting, if you'd like to read it, you can find it right here in this Cholesterol & Heart Disease forum, look for the thread titled "Letter to WebMD", or click here to open it in a new window (http://forum.lowcarber.org/showthread.php?s=&threadid=269).

Protein Power (1996) and Protein Power Lifeplan, (2000) by the Drs. Eades also has several excellent chapters on the importance of cholesterol. You might be able to borrow a copy from your library. I highly recommend it. Here is a quote from the FAQ's page of their website about the concern of cholesterol levels going UP after starting lowcarb .. http://eatprotein.com/ First of all, be aware that you are not doing anything wrong. The most consistent finding after people go on our program is that triglycerides drop and HDL, the "good" cholesterol increases. This indicates that your insulin levels have dropped and you have stopped converting excess amounts of sugar into fats as trigylcerides. Cholesterol is a number that is composed of both good and bad fractions, therefore we don’t tend to track it nearly as close as more specific levels of HDL, triglycerides and LDL. LDL cholesterol is made up of different particles that vary from person to person. Depending on the type of particles that predominate, one is said to have either pattern A or pattern B. With pattern A, the LDL is light, fluffy, and relatively large. This pattern is actually thought to be beneficial. With pattern B, the molecule is heavy, dense, and relatively small. This pattern is thought to be detrimental. Pattern B is a partial consequence of excessively elevated triglycerides. When triglycerides go down after the Protein Power Plan has been adopted, a phenomenon called the "beta shift" occurs where LDL is transformed into pattern A. So, paradoxically, even though the level of LDL appears to increase, the type of LDL that is being formed is usually much healthier. The difficult part is that the lab testing to determine your levels of LDL "A" and LDL "B" can only be done in a research laboratory with electrophoresis methods. While we cannot be 100% certain that this is what happened in your case, the research strongly supports this view.

The most important thing is to look at the overall picture. With the Protein Power approach we look at the triglyceride/HDL ratio as one of the best measurements of risk for heart disease. An upper limit of 5 is considered desirable, with anything over that indicating an increased risk. Some measures to help bring down your cholesterol and LDL levels are: stay on the plan (some people panic and feel that the plan is causing the opposite effect), take a "no-flush" niacin 500 mg 2-3 capsules per day, increase your fiber intake with perhaps psyllium seed powder-1-2 TBS mixed in water per day, and avoid excessive saturated fats and trans fats (fried foods and margarine.)One thing you might consider is reducing or eliminating red meat and egg yolks for a month, while maintaining a lowcarb regimen that focuses on increased intake of monounsaturated fats and oils -- then get things checked again. Not because red meat and egg yolks have cholesterol in them, but because they have ARACHIDONIC ACID in them. Again, this is from the Protein Power website FAQ's ... You can’t increase your protein foods haphazardly and continue to eat carbohydrates as you do now and expect to see results. In fact, you’ll be worsening your problems if you do so.

Second, there are some people who may have problems with large amounts of red meat and large quantities of egg yolks. These people: have elevated blood pressure and/or cholesterol, retain abnormally high amounts of fluid, and/or suffer from inflammatory conditions such as skin rashes, asthma, allergies, bursitis, or arthritis.

It’s not the cholesterol in red meat and egg yolks that is the problem. It’s the fact that they are high in arachidonic acid, which can promote or worsen the above conditions.

Here is the strategy for these folks to follow: Eliminate red meat and egg yolks from your diet completely for three weeks. At the end of the three week period, take stock of your health. Has it improved? Eat a large portion of red meat and eggs for a couple of meals and observe what happens. If your problems reappear of get worse, you are sensitive to arachidonic acid and should have these foods only once in a while. When you do have them, make sure to remove as much of the fat from the beef as possible. Grill the beef. This will reduce the arachidonic acid by as much as 35%. Another option is to marinate the meat in a combination of red wine and olive oil or light sesame oil for 24 hours before grilling.

As far as eggs are concerned, have no more than one or two whole eggs at a sitting, and eat egg whites the rest of the time. Also, you should avoid margarine altogether (as everyone should).Don't give up on lowcarb just yet. Eliminating red meat, egg yolks and high-fat dairy at the same time as increasing your intake of monounsaturate fats from nuts and seeds, natural nut and seed butters and their oils, olives and olive oil and avocados, as well as consuming more fatty fish such as salmon, mackerel, tuna and sardines -- may go a long way toward improving your health.

Hope this has been helpful.. :)

Doreen

[doreen T]

You may also find the following online articles very enlightening The Cholesterol Myths (http://www.ravnskov.nu/cholesterol.htm) by Uffe Ravnskov, MD, PhD

Medical Truths - Cholesterol Myth (http://medicaltruth.com/pdf-files/cholesterolmyth.pdf) by T. J. Moore (pdf format)

Cholesterol Myth (http://www.second-opinions.co.uk/cholesterol_myth_1.html) by Barry Groves, author of "Eat Fat, Get Slim". Actually, his entire site .. http://www.second-opinions.co.uk/index.html .. is very well-researched on many issues of health that have a political/profit-making finger in the proverbial pie.Doreen

[Anna]

Hi Hobotica,

I find the book "Eat right for your blood type" (Dr. Peter J. D'adamo) very helpful in selecting my food choice, even in following the Atkin's Diet. Check this book out and maybe you can find the missing links in your problem. According to the info in this book and from my experience, people with blood type O are the one who would respond best the high animal protein diet, while the type AB would fare better with a vegetarian one.

Hope this help.

[doreen T]

Thankyou for mentioning the Eat Right for Your Type program. Is that what you are following, and is it helpful for you??

I've looked at it briefly, but of course being type A, it recommends primarily lots of grains, many of which I have already tested allergic to .. :( .. On the other hand, it suggests for type A to avoid dairy, egg yolks and certain seafood, and to choose poultry, ocean fish and game meats as the main sources of animal-based protein.

Why not pop into our Introductions forum, say hello and tell us a bit more about yourself. I'm looking forward to reading more about your lowcarb success!

Doreen

[hobotnica]

Hi again,

would you believe that i read the Eat Right book almost 4 years ago! I thought it was also an awesome theory. Again, I applied it to both mine and my husband's diets. He (being an A) responded incredibly well. His lifelong debilitating summer allergies disappeared in 3 DAYS after he eliminated dairy from his diet. The program did not have much effect on me though. Through contact with others in the same boat on the internet, I turned to the Zone diet..no effect. That got me onto the anti-yeast diet...some small positive effects. Followed by an elimination diet. Then onto Sugar Busters, Protein Power, Dr. Bernstein's Diabetes solution, and most recently Atkins. All of these have been combined with formal exercise regimes.

Like I said...I am bound and determined to lick this in my lifetime. I'm going to try reducing red meat and fatty cuts of meat, butter, cheese, eggs and see what happens in the next few weeks.

Wish me luck!

[bluugirl]

yes, eat more fish, nuts(don't go overboard), veggies, olive oil, fiber, water, tofu-products.

[IslandGirl]

... nobody's mentioned the GO Diet (specifically for resistant hypoercholesteremia, at http://www.go-diet.com.

Dr. Goldberg, a former "AtKid" and confirmed LowCarber, had cholesterals resistant to 'basic' LC, and has done plenty o' research (especially re yogurt and non-saturated fats and oils). The book is published and available, the website is HIGHLY informative. I recommend it.

Normally, I would also mention that (this is in the back of my head from 3 years+ of LC and LC EMail List communications and sharing, wish I could dig up specific references, though the Atkins online newsmagazine comes to mind) cholesteral #s often rise or spike "briefly" and then start to decline. I believe the Atkins Centre for Complementary Medicine expects it CAN take up to 3 months or so before levels start to decline. You may wish to put this in context with how long you have been consistently LowCarbing with one or another relatively low-carb (Atkins, PP, Bernstein, et al) plan, and then decide if you want to change things or stick it out for a while longer. The ingested ESSENTIAL fatty acids are, well, essential... just don't have to be saturated.

Hope this helps.

[Anna]

Hi Doreen, Hobotnica and all,

Dorren, thank you for your warm welcome ! I enjoyed reading your many posts. A newbie to this Atkins program (starting since August 1), I think I owe my success so far on this program mostly thanks to the wealth of information shared by you all in this forum.

So I guess it should be my turn to share with you how I've been doing... I've lost 8 lbs during my 2 weeks of induction, experience brief periods of extreme tiredness on 3rd day & 4th day and then I start to feel ok after that (not at my peak of energy yet, but no too bad either). All the minor aches and pains (lower back pain, ankles, wrists, etc..) seem to be gone away. No longer crave for white starch & sugary foods. (Whenever I feel cravings for fruits, I would eat two or three cherries or a small plum with salt ). If there is a complaint about this way of eating, it would be that I find it much harder to exercise (stamina and endurance seriously reduced when on protein diet instead of complex carb). Other than this set back, I find this a very convenient, no starving way of loosing weight. Energy level is more stable, as there are no surges and then crash due to blood sugar swings!

I incorporate my knowledge from the "Eat right for your blood type" to the Atkins diet. I would eat more of the "beneficial" type of protein for my type O (salmon for example) and stay away from
pork, etc..

From Dr. Atkin's books and people's comments, I also aware of potential problems with kidney, liver and constipation problems. So along with vitamins supplements, I also take herbal liver cleanse and kidney & gall bladder formulas (Planetary formula - by Michael Tierra). At night, I take 1 teaspoon of the psyllium fiber along with 2 capsules of "Red Clover combination" (blood cleansing /mild herbal laxative). I also take some herbal thyroid glandular complexes at mealtimes to help with my low thyroid. At any meals that I feel a little heavy or hard to digest, I use "Pancreatin" from KAL, it's an excellent enzyme product.

Results: I got the metabolic benefit of the ketosis state but able to eliminate the toxic waste product of a high animal protein diet thanks to the herbal formulas. My skin looks clearer, nicer, people says there's a glow to it..
Even though I'm in deep ketosis, my breath doesn't smell bad, because there's adequate elimination of bowel).

Hobotnica, I think you can benefit from the herbal liver cleanse/tonic since it's the organ that regulate our cholesterol. "Pancreatin" (I found that KAL has the best) should also help you digest better the meaty and fatty meals of the low carb program. Have you had your thyroid function tested ?

Good Luck to all of us !

Anna

[Margaret]

:thdown:
My husband has a history of high blood pressure and high cholestral - also angina. When I read of the Atkins diet we thought this was our answer. He had only been on the diet 3 weeks and was admitted to hospital as an emergency and has been in twice since. His angina has become very unstable. This diet is not for the likes of him.

[barrygroves]

Don't be worried about your cholesterol reading as it is meaningless. Cholesterol rises steadily with age and studies have demonstrated that we live longer if this continues into old age. So to fix any figure as a norm for everyone is ridiculous, just as it is to insist that it be lowered.

Also any one-off reading is meaningless as it depends entirely on what you were doing or feeling in the minutes before the blood test was done. For example: if you ran to the surgery it will be higher than if you walked; if you stood in the waiting room, it will be higher than if you sat; and if you were worried about the test, or your doctor looked worried, it will also be higher. This is because a raised cholesterol is part of the 'fight-or-flight' reflex.

The other thing that wil be discussed is the relationship between LDL and HDL, the former being 'bad' and the latter 'good'. Again this is nonsense. Cholesterol is not water soluble, so it is transported around the body in packets containing other nutrients. The packets are called "lipoproteins" (lipids + proteins) -- the last letter in both of the abbreviations. Cholesterol is a major building block in cell repair and regeneration, a process that is going on all the time. It is carried around the body from the liver to where it is needed by LDL; the used cholesterol from older cells is transported back to the liver for recycling by HDL. To put it in terms of house renovation, LDL is the truck bringing new bricks to the building site and HDL is the skip taking old materials away for recycling. There are no 'good' or 'bad' lipoproteins or cholesterol, they are both essential.

One other point: Your body isn't in the habit of making things that are harmful to itself. If it wants 8.1 mmols swishing around each litre of your bloodstream, then it's a good idea to let it get on with its job. It seems that the biggest risk factor of all is mucking about with your body unnaturally.

Statins
The next point is more important: The statin studies do show that statins confer small benefits in middle-aged men who have already had one heart attack. But not because of cholesterol-lowering, as the benefits were the same whether cholesterol was lowered a lot or not at all. So it is NOT lowering of cholesterol that is the beneficial action, but something else. Even then the benefits are small.

And secondly, there have been shown to be no benefits in men who haven't had a heart attack, no benefits in the elderly and, significantly for most of this list, no benefits in women of any age whether they have had a heart attack or not. So there is no evidence that Zocor (simvastatin) will benefit you at all.

And lastly, statins have a range of serious side effects. You may have heard a couple of years ago, about one statin, Baycol, being removed from the market because of deaths associated with its use. But all the other statins carry similar risks. The process in the body by which cholesterol is synthesised, and which statins inhibit, is the same pathway that the body uses to make co-enzyme Q10, probably the most important antioxidant. Co-Q10 is also used in large quantity by the heart. It is no coincidence that people taking statins have an increased risk of conjestive heart failure.

And as they lower cholesterol, the also increase cancer risk, particularly from breast cancer.

By the way, a report in the Journal of the American Medical Association, found that doctors were the third leading cause of death in the USA in 1999. (Starfield B. Is US Health Really the Best in the World? JAMA 2000; 284: 483-485). Four years later, another report elevated them into first place (http://www.garynull.com/documents/iatrogenic/deathbymedicine/deathbymedicine1.htm). So, in the USA, doctors are the leading cause of death -- and there is no reason to suppose that doctors in New Zealand, who follow US guidelines, are any better. Bear in mind that it was these people who set the standards for cholesterol -- and who push cholesterol-lowering drugs.

[barrygroves]

Don't be worried about your cholesterol reading as it is meaningless. Cholesterol rises steadily with age and studies have demonstrated that we live longer if this continues into old age. So to fix any figure as a norm for everyone is ridiculous, just as it is to insist that it be lowered.

Also any one-off reading is meaningless as it depends entirely on what you were doing or feeling in the minutes before the blood test was done. For example: if you ran to the surgery it will be higher than if you walked; if you stood in the waiting room, it will be higher than if you sat; and if you were worried about the test, or your doctor looked worried, it will also be higher. This is because a raised cholesterol is part of the 'fight-or-flight' reflex.

The other thing that wil be discussed is the relationship between LDL and HDL, the former being 'bad' and the latter 'good'. Again this is nonsense. Cholesterol is not water soluble, so it is transported around the body in packets containing other nutrients. The packets are called "lipoproteins" (lipids + proteins) -- the last letter in both of the abbreviations. Cholesterol is a major building block in cell repair and regeneration, a process that is going on all the time. It is carried around the body from the liver to where it is needed by LDL; the used cholesterol from older cells is transported back to the liver for recycling by HDL. To put it in terms of house renovation, LDL is the truck bringing new bricks to the building site and HDL is the skip taking old materials away for recycling. There are no 'good' or 'bad' lipoproteins or cholesterol, they are both essential.

One other point: Your body isn't in the habit of making things that are harmful to itself. If it wants 8.1 mmols swishing around each litre of your bloodstream, then it's a good idea to let it get on with its job. It seems that the biggest risk factor of all is mucking about with your body unnaturally.

Statins
The next point is more important: The statin studies do show that statins confer small benefits in middle-aged men who have already had one heart attack. But not because of cholesterol-lowering, as the benefits were the same whether cholesterol was lowered a lot or not at all. So it is NOT lowering of cholesterol that is the beneficial action, but something else. Even then the benefits are small.

And secondly, there have been shown to be no benefits in men who haven't had a heart attack, no benefits in the elderly and, significantly for most of this list, no benefits in women of any age whether they have had a heart attack or not. So there is no evidence that Zocor (simvastatin) will benefit you at all.

And lastly, statins have a range of serious side effects. You may have heard a couple of years ago, about one statin, Baycol, being removed from the market because of deaths associated with its use. But all the other statins carry similar risks. The process in the body by which cholesterol is synthesised, and which statins inhibit, is the same pathway that the body uses to make co-enzyme Q10, probably the most important antioxidant. Co-Q10 is also used in large quantity by the heart. It is no coincidence that people taking statins have an increased risk of conjestive heart failure.

And as they lower cholesterol, they also increase cancer risk, particularly from breast cancer.

By the way, a report in the Journal of the American Medical Association, found that doctors were the third leading cause of death in the USA in 1999. (Starfield B. Is US Health Really the Best in the World? JAMA 2000; 284: 483-485). Four years later, another report elevated them into first place (http://www.garynull.com/documents/iatrogenic/deathbymedicine/deathbymedicine1.htm). So, in the USA, doctors are the leading cause of death -- and there is no reason to suppose that doctors in New Zealand, who follow US guidelines, are any better. Bear in mind that it was these people who set the standards for cholesterol -- and who push cholesterol-lowering drugs.

[Kestrel]

Thanks for the insight, Dr. Groves. Hope you'll stick around...

[hobotnica]

Hi Y'all,

I'm now a lifelong low-carber. I had a walking glucose tolerance test a few months ago. (they put a tiny needle in your stomach, and attach you to a small beepr-like machine that takes your glucose readings every 3 minutes for three entire days, and you must follow a particular diet for these three days). The results were very telling. I mentioned before that diabetes runs rampant in my family, and it looks like I'm on the threshold....but not there yet. It is complicated to explain, but the easy version is that my body produces too much insulin upon eating, then cannot produce enough on a regular basis throughout the day. This wreaks havoc on my blood sugar levels and is responsible for many of the health problems I've been experiencing over the years. (If anyone is interested in all the details, let me know and I'll explain more).

Anyways....I'm on a permanent low-carb diet for the rest of my life in an effort to prevent diabetes. I'm using a blood glucose monitor to help me figure out what foods cause my blood sugar to increase. I have found that the Glucose Index was useless for me because my body wasn't responding the way it was supposed to (e.g. tomatoes have the same effect as chocolate pudding for me, and cooked bell peppers make my blood sugar skyrocket whereas raw peppers have a negligable effect.)

I'm still in the learning process, but am feeling much better these days. Strangely, my cholesterol went down to normal levels within a few weeks of adjusting my diet, stayed normal, and now, 5 months later, they have rocketed back up to 8.0 :( I'm taking it one day at a time.

[runner54]

I'm in the same boat. Although I only wanted to lose 10-15 pounds, I have lost none. My husband, who is already thin, lost weight quickly even though he didn't need to. It seems, in the couples I know, that it men usually lose weight more easily than women, but it is discouraging, since I felt I needed to and he didn't.

I was suspicious that my thyroid levels might be contributing, so I had them checked, and they are well within the normal range--not even borderline.

Then there's the cholesterol problems. I have always had healthy cholesterol readings. Last year, the total was 182. (I don't remember the breakdowns.) This time, after being on the diet for about five months, they went up to 224: TRI-29; LDL-159; HDL-59. While the triglicerides are low, the LDL rate is a little scary to me since my levels have always been good. Exercise is a regular part of my life, though I had tapered off a little before getting my blood tested.

I'm not wanting to give up low-carb because I do feel better on it than anything else I've tried. I'm just wondering if some tweeking is necessary.

[Skyangel]

I notice in your first post that you've only been on Atkins for 2 months. I experienced a dramatic rise in cholesterol at the 3 month point, a drop at 5 months and a bigger drop at 11 months. My triglicerides, 239 before LC were 359 at 3 months then dropped to 96 and stayed there.

It may take some time for you to see improved blood lipid results.

I also added fish oil capsules and policosanols at the 5 month point and and attribute part of a 30 point drop in LDL in the next 6 months to that regimine.