So, the last actual and real talk-about-me post was the one I made after my mammogram. What I failed to mention that day was that I also had blood drawn for a bunch of standard tests that they do to ladies-who-are-becoming-old. Haha, let me tell you something, 40 is young. Very, very young, and also, you are finally smart enough to know that! But back to the blood work, I didn’t mention it, because I figured it was a non-issue. After all, I am watching what I eat, I’ve been exercising a little bit, and life ought to be cruising right along. Right? Wrong.
They called me on Wednesday to let me know that I have high cholesterol. It was 215, which is not real far over the line, but my ldl was 129. Stop eating fried and fatty foods the man says. Exercise the man says. Umm, I’m not eating fried and fatty foods, and I have been exercising, so….. now what? Come back in four months for a recheck. Ummmmkaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay. Well.
So. I had a little meltdown. A minor freakout. Because I was already limiting my food choices to try to adhere to the food pyramid and get the rest of this weight lost, and now I am even more limited, because I have to avoid saturated fats and dietary cholesterol, and WHOA, just when I thought I had a grip on the food thing, BAM! Haha, joke’s on me.
And the foods I have to avoid are not necessarily the ones you would think! For instance, when it comes to cutting saturated fat and cholesterol, bacon grease is a better choice than butter. Yeah, that shocked me, too. Nuts are a better choice than beef. But chicken and fish are pretty much awesome, and you can even have fried chicken IF you choose canola oil for your frying. Microwave popcorn is a no-no, but you can pop your own on the stove using olive or canola oil (or bacon grease 😉 ), and then season it to taste with any spice you like. Bonus point: if you burn it, you don’t have to evacuate the premises and risk being drummed out of the family. And you can still eat whatever doesn’t stick.
The upshot of all that is that I am tracking food as outlined on the food pyramid, except I have a whole huge chart thing that includes the calories, the saturated fat and the cholesterol. Yep, it now takes almost as much time to chart my food as it does to eat it. Yay me.
And that was June 11th.
See if you can change the oils you use when you do use an oil, either to cook or to eat. If you can stick with the highest quality olive oil it is well worth it, although unfortunately quite a bit more expensive
My husband was diagnosed with high cholesterol, even though he is as skinny as a bean pole. life is so unfair. Anyway, we eat a lot of veggies that are steamed or fried in olive oil. Cream sauces and stuff like that are fatty, and to be avoided.
I pop my popcorn with olive oil and it is quite yummy. 🙂