I’m 42 and have “familial hypercholesterolemia” (FH). My father died at the age of 57 from a sudden heart attack.
In my early 30’s my Primary Dr. and my cardiologist wanted to put me on statins and or move me to a non processed whole food plant based diet. Before that point, I think I ate pretty healthy, lots of veggies, lean meats (turkey, chicken), fish and a red meat once in a while. I also ate a lot of egg whites, exercising every day. I never really ate dairy too often because of major stomach issues
For about 8 yrs I’ve been following a Whole food plant based diet. Eating food “as grown”, no sugar and very very little oil and salt if any.
Outside of vacation or special events when I let myself eat pretty much anything (meat, sugar, whatever), I pretty much stick to the plants. I’m “mostly vegan” as you would say.
This has helped my cholesterol a lot, but even doing all of that, it’s still high! I never went on the meds, but rethinking things now.
I guess the only real issue I’m struggling with is that I don’t want it to have a negative effect on my training. My lifts still keep going up. Given that my goal is over all health and longevity and of course management of FH, do you think this is seriously going to slow or stop my strength GainzZz? I’m already well aware the whole food vegan diet is inferior when it comes to making progress in the gym.
I’m 6’2, 185 and I average between 180-200 grams of protein per day, depending on the day. I’m getting about 12-14 grams of Leucine per day.
If there is anything you think I should consider in my situation, or even if you think i should keep doing what I’m doing, it would be great to get your thoughts.
While I can’t speak specifically to you and your case given the medicolegal issues, I would strongly recommend a statin or combination of statin and ezetimibe or even a statin and PCSK-9 inhibitor depending on risk factors, numbers, and patient goals.
In short, I would not expect a person with FH to be able to manage their cholesterol levels in context of cardiovascular risk via diet and lifestyle alone. I also would notexpect a statin to have any significant effect on training outcomes at all, outside of helping someone live longer and experience those gainzZz for a longer period of time.
We spend a lot of time talking about cholesterol, statins, and training outcomes at our seminar and the gist of it is- take them when needed, they are very well tolerated in most cases and are not expected to alter your training at all.
I’m going to make an appointment with my cardiologist at the start of the year.
So, just to follow up on my diet, since I’m pretty much avoided cholesterol foods most of the time (pretty much anything with a mother or a face), is there anything I should keep in mind to maximize my gainzZz? Double protein, take a leucine supplement? is that what Peri Rx is?
I don’t think avoiding dietary cholesterol is likely to have helped outside of avoiding dietary fat, though even this depends on other factors like total calorie, fiber, and sugar intake…
I don’t think you need to up the protein or take leucine independently either. Peri Rx is a combination of BCAAs (leucine, valine, isoleucine), creatine, beta alanine, and other supplements that I think can improve recovery and performance based on current data. I wouldn’t necessarily have you take that just because you’re about to go on a statin or because you have FH.
I might be up for some diet experimentation at some point soon. I’ll reach out to your team for a consult.
There is so much conflicting information out there about dietary cholesterol and cardiovascular disease when it comes to animal products. It’s easy to see why most people say screw it with trying to eat a “healthy diet”, whatever that is…
I guess that’s why I stick to lentils and oatmeal. I have not seen any conflicting information about them when it comes to cardiovascular disease. I feel like I have more on the line with the bad cholesterol gene.