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Mightyqueen, that is unbelievable! I feel the same thing happened to me with my arteries seemingly being fine for 50 years, then I go vegetarian and I get blockage a year later. Bizarre. I don't feel like I'm eating more cheese than a did before, pretty much the same. I have lost 15 lbs since going vegetarian, but have plateaued. I still want to lose 20 lbs to get down to the weight I was when I was in great shape.
Mightyqueen, that is unbelievable! I feel the same thing happened to me with my arteries seemingly being fine for 50 years, then I go vegetarian and I get blockage a year later. Bizarre. I don't feel like I'm eating more cheese than a did before, pretty much the same. I have lost 15 lbs since going vegetarian, but have plateaued. I still want to lose 20 lbs to get down to the weight I was when I was in great shape.
It's highly unlikely that your arteries were clear if, like most, you were following the Standard American Diet (SAD); the one where people eat "everything in moderation." In the US, the beginnings of artery disease start very early in life; and blueberries, apples, oats, potatoes, rice, spinach, kale, broccoli, and walnuts aren't the cause. The disease progresses over time unless there is an appropriate intervention. As many of the plant-based docs have said, the first sign of heart disease is often sudden death.
The leading cause of death in Western countries is heart disease. Possibly as many as 200,000 to 300,000 people in the United States have heart attacks every year – 1 million patients visit the hospital each year for the same reason. The third leading cause of death is another disease of the arteries, strokes. Many other diseases, from hearing loss to impotence, are also caused by closure of the blood supply to vital tissues.
The older you are the greater your chance of artery disease.
We all start out with baby clean arteries, but that soon changes with consumption of the rich Western diet. Children raised on cow’s milk, meat, and other delicacies soon show fatty streaks (the earliest stage of atherosclerosis) – in their aorta. This damage is seen as early as 9 months of age, and all children on this diet show artery damage by age 3 years. These streaks eventually evolve into the plaques that are commonly seen on angiograms and at autopsy in adults."
We can't fool Mother Nature. Sure, we can drop most obvious artery-clogging foods like steaks, burgers and fries, while keeping our comfort favs, including some highly processed "health foods," eggs, milk, cheeses, chips, some crackers, cheese pizza, certain free plant oils, etc. close to our chest, but it all shows in the final wash.
I know my arteries weren't clear, but just weird they got worst, or at least that's when I started feeling chest pains when exercising, after a year of not eating meat. I've been an exerciser since I was 20 and always watched what I ate, for the most part. Never liked fast food. My heritage is Greek, so mom made Mediterranean type foods growing up. (Mom has high cholesterol also, so diet was definitely not the problem for her.)
I watched that video interview above. Scary. Didn't even know thin veins was a thing.
Meat was easy for me to give up, don't miss any of it (except burgers and hot dogs on the BBQ). But cheese is tough to give up, I love feta with salads, and I have cream cheese on half a whole wheat bagel for breakfast on my way to work each day. And pizza. How can people live without pizza!
I know my arteries weren't clear, but just weird they got worst, or at least that's when I started feeling chest pains when exercising, after a year of not eating meat. I've been an exerciser since I was 20 and always watched what I ate, for the most part. Never liked fast food. My heritage is Greek, so mom made Mediterranean type foods growing up. (Mom has high cholesterol also, so diet was definitely not the problem for her.)
I watched that video interview above. Scary. Didn't even know thin veins was a thing.
Meat was easy for me to give up, don't miss any of it (except burgers and hot dogs on the BBQ). But cheese is tough to give up, I love feta with salads, and I have cream cheese on half a whole wheat bagel for breakfast on my way to work each day. And pizza. How can people live without pizza!
You're surprised that your arteries worsened as you aged, but that's exactly what happens when people continue to eat foods high in saturated fats and cholesterol; and strenuous exercise doesn't stop the problem from progressing. Look at Jim Fixx.
You know, one criticism of the studies that compare dairy and other sources of saturated fats to carbs, is that they group all carbs including refined sugars, pastries, chips and pizza in with fruits and veggies. Duh!
Still, don't overlook this from the above article:
"Dairy fat and heart disease
In a nutshell, researchers found that dairy fat was not associated with a higher risk of cardiovascular disease (defined as nonfatal heart attack, fatal heart disease, and stroke) when compared with the same amount of calories from carbohydrates. However, replacing about 5% of calories from dairy fat with a similar amount of unsaturated fat from vegetables or vegetable oil was linked to a 24% lower risk of cardiovascular disease.
"Overall, the results are consistent with current dietary recommendations to consume mostly unsaturated fats rather than saturated fats," says Dr. Frank Hu, professor of nutrition at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and senior author of the study."
BTW, here's another tidbit from Dr. McDougall's website:
Kelly Caraway: Choosing diet over drugs after a heart attack https://www.drmcdougall.com/health/e...kelly-caraway/
"...They know that 8 out of 8 studies performed to establish the benefits of angioplasty with or without stents all show no improvement in survival. Every well-read doctor knows that bypass surgery does not save lives in the vast majority of cases, and that all patients attached to the heart-lung machine during this major operation suffer from brain damage, at least to some degree."
There's the low saturated fat, low cholesterol, high grain, high fruit and vegetable Mediterranean Diet; and there is the individual interpretation of the Mediterranean Diet which may result in overconsumption of saturated fats, cholesterol, sweets, and processed foods.
Fruits, legumes, veggies and whole grains do not clog arteries. It's your life and your choice, but regularly following the plant-based docs' websites can be a strong motivator to do what's best for your body.
A really good read is How Not To Die by Dr. Michael Greger. He has a chapter on how not to die from heart disease.
Just an aside, Dr. Greger's 65 year-old grandmother was once sent home to die since she had end-stage heart disease and doctors could no longer perform bypasses on her. She underwent treatment at the Pritikin Clinic, continued o follow a plant-based diet, and lived to the age of 96 years.
Dr. John McDougall, like most of us, grew up on the SAD, and he had a stroke when he was a young adult. He eventually changed his ways to a plant-based program, and is still around and healthy at about the age of 70 years with no further cardiovascular events.
I went vegetarian one year ago. I recently had blood work done, my cholesterol level was exactly the same as it was a year ago, 260. I do not take any meds.
Maybe a year isn't enough time to see any reduction, but I would have thought it would have dropped a little. Plus, I ended up in the hospital last week for blockage in my artery and had a stent put in, doctor said it was 99% blocked! How did it get worst over the past year when I was eating healthier. I'm perplexed and feel defeated.
260 is very high. My total cholesterol dropped from 220 to 160 after losing weight and eating a lowfat vegetarian diet.
I think the point you missed, pacific2, is that both the OP and me did not have high cholesterol UNTIL we went vegetarian.
It's not just some kind of coincidence.
What I think might be the causation is that when I ate meat, I ate mostly lean meats, and animal protein holds you for longer than plant foods do. Changing one's diet from meat to non-meat requires an adjustment in that you might have to eat more frequent meals because hunger comes on more quickly.
When I first stopped eating meat, I did not immediately understand that, and I ate more because I was hungry earlier but did not make the "main" meals I was used to eating any lighter. So, I was having a full lunch and dinner and snacking in between, adding up to more calories--and sugar and fat--than I ate when I ate meat.
Some people assumed that I would "feel better" once I gave up meat, and that was not true (just as quitting smoking six years ago did not make me "feel better", either.) I was hungry more often, I was trying to figure out what to eat trying to fit a vegetarian diet into my life, since I don't have the leisure of scads of time to plan and shop for meal and chop **** all night long, nor do I have the desire to make food preparation a main focus at this stage of my life.
The thing that helped was using a food diary (I used My Fitness Pal, there are others) to track what I was actually eating. In this way I could maintain a vegetarian diet while still monitoring my nutritional intake.
I am putting this down in hope that it may help someone who is frustrated with giving up meat and not showing any health benefits from doing so.
No animal products at all, and no oil. That's what you need to do.
Then, if you are still losing weight, like I am, give it time to get lower cholesterol numbers until your weight has stabilized.
Even though my cholesterol is still high, after 7 months on the McDougall diet (no animal products and no oil), my blood pressure is down to 107/81 from 168/86. I've lost 20 pounds. And my blood sugar is down from 106 to 96.
But, the key is - no animal products whatsoever. And no oil.
Cheese used to be my downfall, too. You can find other ways to enjoy your food, without eating cheese. I am a big eater and I like to snack at night. What you do, is you find other things you can eat to your heart's content, that you like - even if you don't like them quite as much as your old habits.
But, you don't have to starve, and you don't have to just eat kale. I hate kale LOL.
For instance, right now I'm snacking on Wasa whole grain crackers and homemade hummus with no oil. No, it's not onion dip and Ruffles chips, but it's still dang good :-)
You're surprised that your arteries worsened as you aged, but that's exactly what happens when people continue to eat foods high in saturated fats and cholesterol; and strenuous exercise doesn't stop the problem from progressing. Look at Jim Fixx.
Not surprised they worsen as you age. But one year ago I did not have chest pains from exercising, I could maintain a pulse of 125 for 40 minutes easily. One year ago I stopped eating all meats, beef, chicken, pork, and processed meats like hot dogs, sausage, and lunch meats. I've stuck to eating vegetables, beans, fruits, whole wheat grains, and snacked mostly on nuts. I would eat fish a couple times a week. And as I said, cheese. Even started having one glass of wine at dinner each night.
So the surprise is after a year of eating healthier, I developed a clog. If nothing else I would think any clogging I had a year ago would not have worsened enough to land me in the hospital for a stent. I am also surprised my cholesterol levels didn't go lower after a year of not eating meat and dropping 20 lbs.
As already touched upon, unless you give up things like cheese, milk, and animal meat, you can't expect to lower cholesterol drastically on a vegetarian diet that still uses dairy products and eggs. Cheese in particular is horrible.
A vegan diet is much better, and that means no milk, cheese, or eggs, and miminizing oils and saturated fats from sources like coconuts.
I gave those things up and my cholesterol went from mid 260-270's to around 160 range. And that happened even when I occasionally ate things like french fries, chips, and vegan candies/sweets/cookies. And I also have a history of high blood pressure and cholesterol in my family (mother suffered heart attacks, father died from a stroke).
The only time genetics can legitimately be blamed for high cholesterol is a condition called hypercholesterolemia. Most people like myself who have issues with high cholesterol, it is because of our diet and lifestyle, period, and could be changed if you truly dedicate yourself to that lifestyle.
If it means giving up all meat, dairy, and oils, so be it. If it means exercising religiously, so be it too. Whatever it takes, you gotta commit. I suspect some people who continue to have issues with high cholesterol being vegan/vegetarian, is because they are not truly adhering to the diet/lifestyle such programs require.
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