Wow, I typed 'high cholesterol' into Google and I am so glad that I came upon this messageboard. (Isn't Google the best thing ever?) Anyway, I thought I would post my results.

A little background...I am a 31 year-old male. I had my cholesterol tested in 9/04 and it came back TOT-237/LDL-169/HDL-53/Tri-70. This was after years and years of being lazy, eating lots of frozen pizzas, McDonald's, etc. I read "The 8 week cholesterol cure", which really made sense to me and I dedicated myself to running 3 miles several days per week, eating lots of veggies, using olive oil, eating oatmeal and taking fish oil pills. In Jan 2005, I had my blood rechecked and the results were TOT-207/LDL-145/HDL-52/Tri-50. My wife and I had our first baby in April 2005, and I stopped going to the gym and went back to my poor diet. I realized how far I had slipped, and went in for another set of blood tests last week. The results were TOT-206/LDL-142/HDL-43/Tri-105. Now we have purchased a treadmill and I started walking 4.2 mph for 30 minutes every day. I am back to my good diet. No more trans-fats and I will limit saturated fats. Additionally, I started taking 750 mg ENDUR-ACIN, and plan to ramp that up to 1500 mg/day. I'm going to have my blood drawn again in six weeks and will report the results.

Does anyone have any other helpful tips? My family has a history of heart attack/stroke and I want to make sure I do everything I can to live a long life! Again, I'm really glad I found this board!

Wow, I typed 'high cholesterol' into Google and I am so glad that I came upon this messageboard. (Isn't Google the best thing ever?) Anyway, I thought I would post my results.

A little background...I am a 31 year-old male. I had my cholesterol tested in 9/04 and it came back TOT-237/LDL-169/HDL-53/Tri-70. This was after years and years of being lazy, eating lots of frozen pizzas, McDonald's, etc. I read "The 8 week cholesterol cure", which really made sense to me and I dedicated myself to running 3 miles several days per week, eating lots of veggies, using olive oil, eating oatmeal and taking fish oil pills. In Jan 2005, I had my blood rechecked and the results were TOT-207/LDL-145/HDL-52/Tri-50. My wife and I had our first baby in April 2005, and I stopped going to the gym and went back to my poor diet. I realized how far I had slipped, and went in for another set of blood tests last week. The results were TOT-206/LDL-142/HDL-43/Tri-105. Now we have purchased a treadmill and I started walking 4.2 mph for 30 minutes every day. I am back to my good diet. No more trans-fats and I will limit saturated fats. Additionally, I started taking 750 mg ENDUR-ACIN, and plan to ramp that up to 1500 mg/day. I'm going to have my blood drawn again in six weeks and will report the results.

Does anyone have any other helpful tips? My family has a history of heart attack/stroke and I want to make sure I do everything I can to live a long life! Again, I'm really glad I found this board!

Welcome to the site, and CONGRATS. on the new baby. Your numbers aren't too bad, and like U said, U kinda slipped off your routine due to the baby. I'm sure when U get back to the exercising and the normal diet those Trigs. will fall again. Just keep away from those fast food joints, prepacked foods, sugary stuff, white bread, rice and walk off those calories. U can also try 1/4 to 1/2 tsp. of cinnamon each morning, I use the stuff from my spice rack, even though they sell them in capsule form. Just make sure it is fresh, and U can get it in any store, plus it is cheap!!!

Best wishes, and enjoy the new baby....... :wave:

Hi Daniel,

I also got started going the direction I've gone with cholesterol from the same book and am now on 750 mg Enduracin. The research on that shows a high level of safety, but nonetheless be sure that you are getting your liver enzymes checked. The schedule my doctor uses is every six months or after three months if you have increased your dosage. Your doctor may have a different schedule, but I've read of patients taking niacin whose doctors failed to have those tests done, and I just wanted to emphasize the importance in the remote event your doctor is like that.

At my last physical my doctor recommended that I increase my Enduracin to 1000 mg daily. I did that for a week or two before ending up with some unrelated intestinal problems, and I dropped all OTC meds for a couple of months while getting those problems straightened out. In the meantime I'd read that niacin increases homocysteine, and since my homocysteine showed up as slightly elevated in July, I decided when I went back on Enduracin a couple of weeks ago to keep the level at 750 mg rather than increase it and "split the risk." You might want to have your homocysteine level checked before you up your dose, as well, if you haven't already done so.

To increase your HDL, you might consider adding some wine to your diet, if you can handle alcohol. Limit is one drink per day for women and smaller men, two drinks per day for larger men. No saving up for a binge on the weekend, either. I added 19 points to my HDL the time I added about 4 drinks/week to my previous 3, plus added two eggs daily to my previous zero. That's a 26% increase in HDL. From my results when I had fewer eggs, it appears to me that the HDL increase attributable to the increase in alcohol was about 9-10%, and the rest to the eggs. My beverage of choice was a margarita. I'm told that people get better results with red wine. If you try adding eggs to the diet to increase HDL, be aware that it increases both HDL and LDL, in about the same ratio, so the risk ratio doesn't change much. However, if a higher LDL makes you or your doctor nervous, you might want to skip that addition.

Well, I am a fan of cinnamon, wine and eggs, so this additional advice will not be a problem! Thanks for responding.