Why Does Going Keto Raise My LDL?

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Why Does Going Keto Raise my ldl? This is JJ Virgin, four time New.

York Times bestselling author, celebrity nutrition expert.

And Fitness hall of Famer. I've been on a lifelong quest for answers to the toughest health questions and now I'm sharing what I found with you. Welcome to Ask the health expert momnap4 from Instagram asks, why does going keto raise my LDL? Well, there are a couple more questions I have to ask around that and then some info to help. I'll be right back so stay with me.

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All right, so the big first question I have about this is, which LDL is it raising? And you might be going, what the heck are you talking about, jj? So here's the deal. When you're looking at cholesterol, we're looking at HDL and ldl, right? But we gotta go deeper than that because you've got two different types. You've got different types of ldl. You've got big fluffy particles and small dense ones. The big fluffy ones, think of them like clouds. They're not the problem. It's the small dense ones that can pit your endothelial lining, cause scarring, cause that buildup, that can cause heart attacks. So you do not want to have small dense ldl. So when you look at LDL and you say, oh my gosh, this is raising my ldl, you've got to know which type of LDL it's raising, because if it was raising your big fluffies, then it really wouldn't matter. But if it's raising the small dense LDLs, it's problematic. One way you can really look at that is to monitor something called your lp. It's your lipoprotein little A. It's the most atherogenic little cholesterol particle. So that's one thing that you can do here. Now why might this be happening? Well, it could be because you're either eating an excess of saturated fat and pro inflammatory fats or damaged fats, fats that have oxidized already. So vegetable oils have been sitting out in big containers, bad fats that have been fried, that kind of thing. And this is the important thing. So keto, you're eating a super low carb, moderate optimal protein, high fat diet. This does not mean anything's okay as long as it doesn't have carbs. It doesn't mean you can go around eating a bunch of pork rinds. This means that you need to make sure that the types of fats you're eating are anti inflammatory mainly. Right, so clean, healthy fats. What types of fats would those be? That would be things like avocado nuts and seeds, chia flax, hemp, walnuts, almonds, almond butter, cashew butter, olive oil, olives, sesame, and of course, things like cold water, fish. And that you're being careful with things like it's not that you can't eat them, but just don't load up on things like coconut, coconut oil and ghee and that because you want to make sure you're getting the right balance of all of these types of fats. So when you look at a ketogenic diet that you want to do healthy because some of the drawbacks ketogenic diet is you might get too much either damaged fat and Those are simple omega 6s that have been exposed to air or omega 3s that have been exposed to air or you might be getting too much too high of saturated fat or you might be eating the real bad fats like the partially hydrogenated fats. You want to stay away from those. The other challenges with keto is not getting enough fiber and not getting enough greens because then you get super acidic. So here's what you want to focus on here. Make sure that you're getting a lot of fiber. If you're doing nuts and seeds, avocado, coconut, greens, that helps because fiber improves your HDL and can help with making you have good cholesterol levels. Next, make sure that you're focusing more on the Omega 3s and the anti inflammatory and monounsaturated fats. Okay, so we talked about those already. Olive oil, avocados, cold water, fish and seeds. Then make sure that you're adding in deep green leafies. I'm just giving you bonus points here so that you're also not just getting super acidic with this diet, that you've got good acid alkaline balance. There it is. And then of course, make sure when you're going in and getting that cholesterol test that you're going beyond just looking at LDL and hdl. Ask for looking at particle size and number as well and make sure you also get an lp.

This is JJ with Ask the Health Expert.

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