Cholesterol gets so much bad press that it's hard to believe that your body actually needs it. There are two kinds of cholesterol in your body, good cholesterol also known as HDL cholesterol, and bad cholesterol or LDL cholesterol. In your body, cholesterol is required to make hormones, vitamin D and bile salts.
On the other hand, the bad cholesterol can cause you various problems. The main worry with LDL cholesterol is that it could dump cholesterol onto artery walls that will make plaque. In turn, theplaque will narrow and block the arteries. This might be the cause of blood flow to be blocked, which is not good news for your heart.
There are many confusing terms being said when it comes to cholesterol. One of those terms is dietary cholesterol. You may think that all dietary cholesterol is bad, but in fact dietary cholesterol does not raise blood cholesterol as much as you could think. The two bad guys here are trans fatty acids and saturated fats.
So when you think about cholesterol problems what you want to do is reduce your levels of bad cholesterol. The best way to do this is by changing your diets. As well as cutting down on foods with bad cholesterol such as meat, dairy, eggs and seafood, you can also eat different foods that could lower LDL levels.
Trans fatty acids are found in many packaged food. Microwave popcorn, hard stick margarine and a number of French fries from some fast food chains are all culprits. You can cut down your consumption of trans fatty acids that will all create bad cholesterol in your body, by eliminating these foods or finding better substitutes.
You can augment the quantity of good cholesterol in your body at the same time as lowering the bad cholesterol. This is because the existing of good cholesterol in your body signifies that surplus of cholesterol will be taken back to the liver to be excreted out of your body. This indicates you need plenty of good cholesterol because high levels of good cholesterol can reduce risk of heart disease.
Everyday life changes such as eating foods that have soluble fiber and monounsaturated fats and polyunsaturated fats will help to increase good cholesterol levels. You could also increase the amount of physical activity in your daily life to decrease cholesterol levels. Limiting alcohol intake to one glass per day for women and two a day for men is also a great idea.
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