Lower Cholesterol - Quick Facts and Tips

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Love your food and enjoy your lifestyle, suddenly you realise your need to lower your cholesterol level. This is definitely not rare in today’s modern society. Do not wait until you found this out in the hard way. Check your cholesterol level now.

Cholesterol is a waxy, fat-like substance called sterols that is essential to our human cells. We need cholesterol to make vitamin D, hormones, cell membranes and bile salts. It is essential to our development of the brain function. The liver is responsible to produce most of the cholesterol the body needs, with the remaining sourced from dietary intake.

Lipoproteins in our body carries the cholesterol, and there are two main types known as the high density lipoprotein (HDL) and the low density lipoprotein (LDL). Low density lipoprotein is the one which carries the cholesterol from liver to the body, where high level lipoprotein does the reverse. Hence, the lower density cholesterol often referenced as “bad cholesterol”, and high level lipoprotein as “good cholesterol”.

If you have not been tested your cholesterol level, it will be a good idea to include this check in your next visit to your doctor. It is a simple blood test. Understand your cholesterol level periodically. there is certainly benefit to your overall health. The cholesterol level test result consists of your total cholesterol level, triglycerides, high density and low density lipoprotein cholesterol level. This will give your doctor an overall picture of your health. The best total cholesterol reading is 200 mg/dl with a limit between 200 mg/dl to 239 mg/dl. Medical experts predict you are at risk of having heart disease if you have a total of 240mg/dl above cholesterol readings.

High cholesterol level increases your risk of coronary heart disease. With the excessive cholesterol circulating our body, deposits of cholesterol will form the plagues in our artery walls, hence narrowing the blood flow. In worst case, it can block the blood flood to your heart which ends you up with coronary heart disease.

There are a number of factors which will affect your cholesterol level. This includes your diet, eating habits, body weight, body shape, level of exercise, age, agenda and family history. Dietary change is usually the first thing to lower the cholesterol level. Saturated and trans fats are the most important ones to avoid. Saturated fats are mainly animal fats and can be found in seafood, whole-milk diary products like cheese, meat and poultry skin. Other fats such as monounsaturated fats and polyunsaturated fats are helpful to reduce the LDL level. These fats are found in fish and nuts. In addition, soluble fibre like oats has the same effect of reducing the cholesterol level. Increased level of HDL has a protective effect for coronary heart disease.

Medical research shows that exercise reduces the risk of coronary heart disease. It is because exercise improves the lipoprotein profile. The research shows that it is the amount of exercise which is important. It does not matter you exercise extremely hard with high energy, or just general energy consumption exercise. The most critical factor is the amount, you need to exercise in the maximum duration you can. Consult your doctor to ensure the level of exercise is suitable to your health condition. So, get started whether you have high cholesterol or not. Exercise will definitely improve your health.

Why is it that some people can eat all the ice cream and fatty foods they want without increasing their cholesterol or gaining weight, whereas others have to watch their diets so closely? The answer is in our genes. Although it is known that our genes can be influenced by a number of different factors, including our environment, diet, lifestyle, education and personal and family experiences, this doesn’t apply to how our bodies respond to cholesterol. Indeed, no matter what our lifestyle, it seems our genes play an overriding role in our cholesterol response. Some people have to be careful about their diets, while others have much more freedom in their dietary choices. The take home message remains the same – we might not be able to change our genes but we can certainly modify our lifestyle.

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5 Tips For the Non-Photographer Photographer

There is a lot you can do to fake a great picture. If you have the eye of a photographer it is easier than if you don’t, but here are a few pointers for the passionately inclined.

1. A good Camera – If you have the money, a good camera is one that can make all the difference. Some of my favorite are the Canon D series and Nikon D series. You are a better photographer with a tool like this in your belt. If you don’t have a camera like this, then you have to rely more on your eye to get the picture that you want. It is possible, but you have to love the cameras that have a mind of their own.

2. Be Creative – The stand alone tripod shots are ok, but don’t really cut it when you are trying to get amazing shots. Take the camera in hand, take weird angle shots of the people, or scenery in question and you’ll be happier with your final product. The best shots I have taken, are when the people are candid and unaware, and when I did something or took something I didnt even mean to.

3. Lighting – The most important part of taking a picture is the lighting. If you dont have good lighting, the picture won’t look good. If you have too much lighting the image will get saturated and washed out. Where is the median? In your eye. Find a place with subtle tones of light. The more natural the better. Find areas with dimmed, muted light for cool shadows and creative shots. speaking of shadows… they can ruin a picture. Look for shadows everywhere. If there is a shadow of you in the picture, congratulations. You just committed a photographer felony.

4. Placement – Taking a shot off to the side or with a lot of white space, can be cool. But the best shots (especially if you are being hired to take them) are the ones that strategically place the elements well. Think of a sunset without the sun. It can be good, in the right setting, but one that is taken with the beaming rays of the sun flying away from the lens can be epic.

5. People – I like to take pictures of pretty boxes, and nicely decorated room. However, shots of wedding pictures and candid pictures with people in it, make the photo ten times better. Homework: Aim your lens at a beautiful scenery or room, or sanctuary, then watch as nature interacts with it. People, animals, etc… You will be amazed at the depth and perception it ads to your photo.

I hope a few of these tips help you on your quest to become a great photographer. I am not an architect with the lens, but like you, love taking photos and being in them. Practice on family and friends and you will become more confident in your picture taking. Good Luck and keep on clicking.

Brooke is an amateur Seattle wedding photographer and loves wedding photography and giving people information about it.

[Via http://beatrizumadgebea.wordpress.com]

National Nutrition Month - Tackling the Myth of the Food Guide Pyramid

March is National Nutrition Month.  It is an event sponsored by the American Dietetic Association in an effort to raise awareness about nutrition.  The idea of a National Nutritional Month is a good one, however, the ADA still insists that low fat is a must.  Let’s have a look at the paradox of the food guide pyramid and why it is actually an unhealthy way to eat.

Above is the most recent food guide pyramid from the government.  They have changed the way it looks in order to try and keep up with recent research.  No longer do you see the grains at the “base” of the pyramid as you did in the old one.  Now you see it on the left and as the first “step” which still suggests it should be the largest part of your nutritional day.  From the governmental website www.mypyramid.gov you can find their suggestions regarding each category in the pyramid.  Let’s start with grains.

They recommend that half, only half, of your grain serving be whole.  The other half?  I guess it’s o.k. to get that from simple and refined grains.  They recommend eating breads and pastas every day to maintain health simply because they are low fat.  What they fail to inform the public is that these kinds of foods cause massive amounts of insulin to be released and over time this causes obesity and diabetes.  I can’t tell you how many patients I have that want to lose weight and all they eat are “low fat” carbohydrates.

Their information on vegetables and fruits is actually o.k.  It’s not that hard to say ‘eat more.’  The one exception to their fruit recommendations that I have is that they say to eat fruit any way you can get it including canned or dried.  Canned fruits are often in a sugary syrup to maintain flavor and this is extremely high in terms of glycemic load.  Sugar is sugar and just because it comes from a fruit doesn’t mean it’s healthy.  Dried fruit is acceptable once in a while, but drying a fruit raises its glycemic load.  The information is only a little misleading in this area of the pyramid.

If you look at the new pyramid you can see a small yellow sliver in there somewhere.  It is so small that it does not have a correlating category listed at the bottom.  This is supposed to be your entire serving of oils for the day?  This is a major problem.  The healthy oils such as olive oil, coconut oil, nuts, seeds and fish are unbelievably good for your health.  They promote heart health, reduce inflammation, provide a great source of healthy energy and increasing them reduces the carbohydrate intake one consumes. Primitive cultures have been using fats for thousands of years as a source of energy and nutrition.  These cultures, while few and far between now, are not the ones that have the epidemics of heart disease, diabetes and obesity that Western cultures do.  The difference is the amount of carbohydrate that Western cultures consume on a daily basis.  The problem with the current food guide is that all people see is that fat is bad.  It’s so bad it fact that it barely deserves a place in the pyramid.  That’s what the diagram suggests anyway.

The next section is also very misleading.  This section is entitled simply milk.  If milk is going to be consumed it should be raw.  Pasteurization destroys any health benefits outside of the calcium that one might get from milk.  They also recommend you drink skim milk which just makes the sugars in the milk more of a problem.  Milk is also highly allergenic.  There are many people that are allergic to casein, the protein in milk.  It is especially bad for children.  The protein in milk has been linked to increases in the number of kids with diabetes and autism. Asking America to drink more milk could be a worse idea.  If you’re going to consume milk, make sure it is raw and whole.  That is the only way to benefit from milk.  It should still be a small portion of what you have in a day.

The next section is meats and beans.  This section is also o.k. with one exception.  They still can’t get away from the the fact that they want you to go low fat.  They stress lean meats in this section.  While lean meats are good, don’t shy away from cuts of meat with a little more fat in them.  Go ahead and have that steak.  The benefits of the fats in the cut far outweigh any negative.  This steak only becomes problematic when you combine it with steak fries. Keep the carbohydrate count low and the fats and oils from your steak only help you.

The food guide pyramid is designed on flawed data and therefore is flawed itself.  All fats are not bad, as this pyramid suggests.  There are many fats that are actually very good for you, but you’d never know it looking at the schematic they have designed.  It places entirely too much emphasis on carbohydrates which are known to contribute to inflammation, diabetes and obesity.  To make this more appropriate the healthy fats must be emphasized more and carbohydrates much less.

[Via http://thevreelandclinic.wordpress.com]

What can you do with your large cholesterol

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National focus has been on teaching the importance of reducing levels of HDL cholesterol. Now the focus is on the increase in LDL levels as well. When it comes to heart health in the last ten years, doctors have warned of the negative effects of high cholesterol is in the heart. However, recently, physicians began warning of the risks of neglecting the fact of maintaining a healthy LDL level.The is, we must maintain balance when it comes to our health. Maintenance requires conscious effort. Every day, we must ensure that we are eating healthy, staying active and resting when necessary. If necessary, keep a journal. In the paper, the outline of each food you eat and how much and how long each activity took place and then sleep at least six hours nightly.The with body care is a well-run vehicle. We must take precautions to assure we keep this vehicle running properly. We sometimes tend to take more care of our car we make of our body. Modern living has meant that our bodies suffer from neglect. It is imperative that we keep our bodies like we do with other important areas. There are foods and activities that we enjoy every day that will help prevent high cholesterol, however, to maintain healthy levels of LDL cholesterol. Implement some of the foods and practices to maintain their health following: cashews, pecans, almonds or macadamia nuts NutsEating is essential to maintaining a good level of LDL cholesterol and decreasing HDL levels. Nuts provide good fats that the body needs to maintain a healthy heart. Take a handful of nuts and sprinkle on a salad green. Add cashews to rice dishes. Mix a few strawberries, blueberries and dried fruit in your yogurt for breakfast impressive. After a few days, you will begin to experiment with different ways to add nuts to other dishes. There's nothing like taking a handful of gum. Enjoy the crisis. It's amazing how easy it is to add some nuts to your daily diet without hampering the taste, but actually improve the taste and texture of your dishes.Jumping Ropet minutes of jumping rope is worth a half-hour walk. Not just jumping rope increase in heart rate increases and decreases levels of LDL cholesterol HDL. Do you remember as a kid jumping rope to the tune of a potato, two potato, three potato, four? Amazing how easy it is to remember the old days when playing the games of our childhood. Our children and grandchildren will have a lack of capacity we have to do the things they find so easy.Drink WineItalians drinking Red wine with every meal. The reason: the wine contains natural antioxidants. Drinking no more than a glass of red wine a day, your body maintains a level of good cholesterol HDL, besides helping the heart. Remember though, wine is healthy when consumed in moderation. Eating onion OnionsThe amazing! Not only is the brain food onion, onions are recommended in the maintenance of LDL and lower HDL cholesterol levels in your body. Only half of this fascinating plant and is on pace for an incredible increase in good health. Add the onion to scrambled eggs, saute onion and eat on the liver. Check out the myriad ways of preparing and eating onions in Processed Foods www.allrecipes.com.Limit how much money you can save IntakeIt incredible addition to improving their health in preparing dishes at home and use the remains of sandwiches and fried foods. We've become a society of fast food. Fast food has made our bodies to go into traumatic shock. The body is not made to process the foods processed. Take a pinch of our parents. Ate course on earth. No running to the store to buy goods can and processed foods. What began as a little comfort has become a monster. It's OK to eat some processed foods in moderation. However, eating too much has caused health problems we are experiencing a lot today.Eat of FishSalmon, tuna, anchovies, are even higher in omega. Omega fats are good fats necessary for proper maintenance of our bodies. Try to add salmon to your salad green. On the night of pizza, add a few anchovies on the pizza. Tilapia is a fascinating fish, grown raised. A few minor changes can result in a healthier IntakeThrow far body.Decrease Carbohydrates macaroni, potatoes, rice, French potatoes, sugar, egg yolks and organ foods. However, the actions of your fridge and pantry with vegetables. Fresh frozen or canned. All are fine. Try baking, broiling, grilling instead of frying. Reducing the carbohydrates in the diet can increase LDL cholesterol levels and dramatically reduce your HDL level. JuiceOrange Drink orange juice is known to increase LDL levels in individuals with documented as high as 21%. The time to eat at least one glass a day, the flavonoids in orange juice have resulted in surprisingly SmokingNow results.Stop tax snuff has increased, the desire to quit smoking has become more attractive than ever. Furthermore, as an alternative, which will help increase HDL levels in percent.Practicing seven habits of good nutrition and increased activity level may result in your body changing for the better.

Visit how to lower cholesterol naturally

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Fat and why we need it

I’ll admit I’ve gotten 100 times better than where I was at the lowest point in my disorder, but the hardest part of my day is allowing myself to eat fat.  I do eat a fair amount, I know that its good for me, it’s just eating enough to meet what would be a healthy percentage, even though I know I’m getting it from healthy sources.

Unfortunately, dietary “fat” and the description of being “fat” are the same word.  One of the things I have developed as coping mechanism is to call Dietary fat a different word– like “wholesomeness”.  That way I can say, “I need to add some wholesomeness to this meal” and it will frame to myself as being healthy, which it is.

Here is some information about why we need fats in our diets.  Fats (or lipids) have a major role to play in the functioning of the human body. Fats:

• Waterproof the skin
• Insulate the body
• Provide an energy store
• Build cell membranes
• Are a major component of many hormones
• Maintain some of the major systems within the body

Added to this, the fat soluble vitamins A, D, E and K cannot be absorbed without the presence of fat in our system.

Cholesterol

Arguably the best known fat is cholesterol. Many people are concerned about cholesterol levels but know little about the role cholesterol plays in the body.

Cholesterol has many useful functions in the body. Cholesterol:

• is a steroid – the most abundant steroid in the body. From cholesterol a number of other steroid hormones are created, including progesterone, oestrogen and testosterone
• acts in the liver to produce bile acids, which are needed for the digestion of fat in the gut
• is essential for the creation of cell membranes
• is essential in the manufacture of vitamin D

I have also become a believer that its not saturated fats that are the cause for heart disease and obesity in our society (although too much of anything isn’t good.) Think about what our grandparents and great-grandparents ate growing up:  Breakfast was bacon and eggs, probably cooked in real butter, with oatmeal.  For the most part, this isn’t the generation suffering from the obesity epidemic.  Look at a typical breakfast now: Pop Tarts, trans-fat containing muffins, pastries, processed meats, margarines, etc.  Although margarine can be trans-fat free now, just compare the ingredients to that of butter: like a million things I can’t pronounce, vs. “Cream and milk.”

Here is some information on this:

eating more saturated fat lowers the risk for heart disease. That’s what a recent Harvard University study found: People who had the highest saturated fat intake also had the least plaque buildup on their artery walls. The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition described the findings as an “American Paradox.”    

In the Stanford University study that made recent headlines, women on the “fatty” Atkins diet ended up with the healthiest cholesterol levels and the best blood pressure readings, compared to those on other diets, notably the famous Ornish low-fat diet.

Here are a few bullet-points summarizing the current research on saturated fats.

–We typically eat more than a dozen kinds of saturated fat. Some have zero effect on cholesterol. Some raise bad (LDL) cholesterol, but all of them raise good (HDL) cholesterol to a greater extent. That’s a net gain in heart health.

–The nation’s top health organizations have for decades called saturated fat one of the main culprits for diet-related diseases, including obesity, diabetes, heart disease, and cancer. Problem is, this blame stems from research that is now seen as incomplete. For instance, a famous 1953 study took data from six countries, overlooking 16 countries whose numbers provide contradictory evidence. (Like France, for instance, or native cultures in Africa and Canada where high amounts of fat and saturated fat are eaten but heart disease is practically unknown.)

–Since the 1970s, American men have decreased their saturated fat intake by 14 percent and increased their carbohydrate intake by 23 percent–yet rates of obesity and heart disease are increasing. You might say that carbohydrates make people fat, which leads to heart disease. Or that more carbohydrates you eat, the greater your risk for a heart attack.

        

–But these simple numbers only suggest a cause. To prove something, you need a controlled experiment. There have been many such clinical trials, and not one has shown has shown that cutting back on saturated fat reduces heart disease risk.

–When you look at the effect of saturated fat on health, you must also look at the intake of carbohydrates. Many studies have shown that if you replace carbs with fat, your triglycerides levels go down and your good cholesterol goes up. And your bad (LDL) cholesterol particles get bigger, which means they’re less harmful.

–Here’s a paradox for you: A high saturated fat intake decreases blood levels of saturated fat. How can this be? Here’s how: The saturated fat in your blood comes from both the food you eat and from your liver, which produces saturated fat. The more carbs you eat, the higher your insulin levels climb, which signals your liver to produce saturated fat. If you go on a low-carb diet, your insulin levels drop, and so does production of saturated fat.

–A bonus: with low insulin levels, your body can burn more fat for energy, decreasing your sat-fat levels even more.

When it comes down to it, do I practice what I preach?  Yes and no.  I’d love to, but I’m scared because for so many years I have been told fat was bad.  But in reflecting on that, look where that wound me up at one point….at an in-patient eating disorder clinic.  So what harm could it do to increase good sources of fat and continue to avoid highly processed carbs?  (Remember though, healthy, complex carbs are great for you.)

This leads into my next post…

Be strong, be fearless, stay Feerless.

[Via http://feerlessfood.wordpress.com]

Paleo, CrossFit and Cholesterol

Chet sent this email yesterday with results from his latest physical.  The results really speak for themselves, but it goes to show CrossFit and Paleo do work for people.  Keep up the good work Chet!  Has anyone else had something along these lines happen with them?

I wanted to drop you a letter and share with the group my latest physical checkup.  1 year on Crossfit and 6 or so months on Paleo.  You can see that I was very close to having risk factors in 2009.  I was convinced in 2009 that I was a healthy eater, no fast food, not a lot of sweets, tons of vegetables, and Rice, Beans, and Grains.   A 28 point reduction in total cholesterol. – Chet

2/9/2009 2/9/2010 Change Goal Total Cholesterol 199 171 -28 <200 LDL 131 85 46 <130 Triglyceride 53 58 +5 <150 HDL 57 74 +17 >40

There is really a lot more to Cholesterol then the drug companies really want us to know about. Mark Sisson goes into some detail in his article ‘The Definitive Guide to Cholesterol’ The most interesting part was the distinction between large fluffy LDLs and smaller, dense LDL.

“… the smaller, dense LDL particles are the ones believed to be most involved in the process of inflammation that begins the atherosclerosis cascade. And wouldn’t you know it, but it’s a diet high in simple carbs that most readily promotes the formation of these small LDL particles! Unfortunately, this important distinction is probably something your doctor knows very little about…”

[Via http://nutrition.crossfiteastdecatur.com]

Good protein is difficult to find. There are lots of options, but I heard good things of this brand before I even bought … and I am glad I am. Price is great and the taste is better than the best protein I’ve tried. It tastes like a Thin Mint Chocolate Mint shake. Musclemilk want something better, but it is not pure whey protein product as is. Back to ON. It blends really well, you do not have too much protein shake your head swim.

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