Why Cholesterol is your Friend

For years we have been told to stay away from cholesterol – to the extent that one would think it is a poison.

The truth is that cholesterol is extremely important for the proper functioning of the human body, not only for repairing and rebuilding but also for many vital functions.

In fact, cholesterol is so important that if we eat too little of it our body will produce more. And if we eat too much, production goes down. So why are we all trying to get it as low as possible?

In her book Diary of a Legal Drug Dealer, K L Carlson tells of her experience as a pharmaceutical sales rep for statin drugs.

“We where trained to emphasise to physicians the new lower LDL guidelines that where ostensibly created by health experts.” She states the majority of experts who created the lower guidelines have multiple financial ties to pharmaceutical companies. The lower the guidelines the bigger the lasso to rope people into needing these drugs.

Important functions

The human brain is rich in cholesterol – thinking, memory and brain function are totally reliant on it.  If you interfere with the body’s ability to produce cholesterol you will put the brain and nervous system under threat.

Dr Duane Graveline, a former Nasa scientist and astronaut, managed to save his memory by stopping his pills and eating lots of cholesterol-rich foods. He describes his experience in Lipitor: Thief of Memory – Statin drugs and the misguided war on cholesterol.

After the brain, the organs hungriest for cholesterol are the adrenals and sex glands.

All of the sex hormones (testosterone, progesterone and estrogen), plus adrenal hormones, Vitamin D and bile production all require cholesterol. These hormones have many functions from metabolism regulation, energy production, mineral assimilation, brain, muscle and bone formation, behavior, emotions and reproduction.

Cholesterol is also essential for immune health and fighting infections. A mother’s milk provides a huge amount of cholesterol for the development of newborns. It also acts as an anti-oxidant in the body dealing with free radicals.

Cholesterol is essential for the integrity of cell walls and without it cells would not be able to communicate with each other or to transport various molecules into and out of the cell.

Blood cholesterol goes up when we have infections and when something needs healing, such as after surgeries or dental treatments. It also goes up due to stress of any sort, poor quality food, toxicity, gut inflammation, emotional stress, too much alcohol and much more.

Should we not be looking at the reason cholesterol is high and addressing that? Low fat diets are making people fatter, sicker and more tired.

Good quality eggs, meat and fish, coconut oil and butter are essential building blocks for life – don’t be afraid of them.

Saturated fats heal and sustain us mentally, physically and emotionally.

Michelle Owen is a corporate health and wellness speaker, and postural and wellness specialist

www.michelleowen.co.nz