Why cholesterol is important?
First of all, what the heck IS cholesterol?
The simple answer is from the food you eat. It can be virtually any kind of food—even food that contains no cholesterol itself. All the carbohydrates, fats, and proteins you eat contain carbon. The cholesterol is made out of that carbon. Finally, your body, armed with these carbon building blocks, has what it needs to make its own cholesterol.
While 90% of the body’s total cholesterol is made naturally in the liver, your body still needs food to fuel the cholesterol production process.
And… why is cholesterol important?
Cholesterol performs three essential bodily functions:
- It assists in making the outer coating of cells.
- It makes up the bile acids that work to digest food in the intestines.
- It allows the body to synthesize Vitamin D and hormones such as estrogen and testosterone.
Easy answers to your everyday questions – YouTube http://bit.ly/1RYWcvN Mardell Hill
What if I have high “bad” cholesterol?
Here are the three basic rules:
- Restrict your intake of:
- Saturated fats found in animal products such as meat, milk, cheese, and butter.
- Trans fats found in manufactured processed foods such as commercially baked snacks, cakes, and crackers.
- Increase your intake of:
- Fibrous foods such as whole grains, grain breads, oatmeal, greens, vegetables, berries, and legumes. These fibrous foods scrape cholesterol deposits from the blood vessel walls and transport excess cholesterol to the liver for processing and elimination.
- Omega-3 fatty acids by consuming more flax seeds (or oil), walnuts, fish (such as salmon), beans, winter squash, and olive oil.
- Lose weight by exercising more and making lifestyle changes.
For more information on intestinal health, go to: www.intestinalhealthbook.com PURCHASE in Ebook or hardbound and see pages 91-92 for more details on cholesterol.
