Cholesterol is not what you may think. It isn’t “bad” – rather it is the by-product of the body’s intelligence and needs to patch up tissues and vessels that are damaged by acids that come from the foods we eat, the air we breathe, the emotions we feel, and the chemicals we place on our body.
Overall, the best cholesterol diet to lower cholesterol is a diet that reduces inflammation and increases hydration. Whereas the cholesterol-promoting diet is acidic and hot (degenerates tissues), the cholesterol-lowering diet is alkaline and cool (heals and regenerates tissues).
This cholesterol diet is called the alkaline diet or mucus-free diet and consists mainly of hydrating, nutrient, and enzyme-rich foods in organic fruits and vegetables.
The body is always looking to maintain its ideal 80 alkaline/ 20 acidic pH ratio balance of its terrain, but most of us lead highly acidic lifestyles that push this ratio way off balance.
When our internal terrain becomes more acidic than it should be, it becomes hospitable to opportunistic pathogens, bad bacteria, and parasites that take over our energy, and vitality, and lower our overall life quality.
Inevitably, an acidic terrain leads to chronic inflammation which is the basis for the development of many diseases.
But, because of its intelligence and inherent self-preservation mechanism, the body does everything it can to compensate for its degeneration – from leaching electrolytes (alkaline chemistry) from tissues and bones to creating cholesterol as lipid protection against tissue decay and purging toxins through colds and flu.
What is the Purpose of Cholesterol and How Does It Help Protect The Body?
The following excerpt is a wonderful explanation of why cholesterol is produced in the body and why it is highly correlated to acidosis and inflammation. It is written by a wonderful health mentor and naturopath, Dr. Robert Morse, and depicts exactly why diet is key to reversing cholesterol levels and healing the body from inflammation and plaguing:
Why do we ‘plaque’ cholesterol and other lipids? Your liver produces an abundant amount of cholesterol, which is an important lipid used by the body for many reasons. By definition, a lipid is any one of a group of fats or fat-like substances characterized by their insolubility in water and solubility in fat solvents such as alcohol, ether, and chloroform. The term is descriptive rather than a chemical name such as 'protein' or 'carbohydrate.'
Lipids include true fats (esters of fatty acids and glycerol); lipoids (phospholipids, cerebrosides, waves); and sterols (cholesterol, ergosterol). A large portion of a cell’s membrane wall is cholesterol.
The adrenal glands use cholesterol to make cortical-type steroids, which are, in part, the body’s anti-inflammatories. So why does cholesterol build up in the lining of the vascular system and throughout other tissues in the body? This build-up is known as plaque. To answer this question you must first understand inflammation, or acidosis, and the role of steroids in the body.
Inflammation simply means that the body is on fire. This inflammation or fire can exist at low levels or become a raging blaze. Cancer is an excellent example of a raging fire. As we discussed earlier, inflammation is caused by acidosis from what you eat, drink, and breathe, what you put on your skin, what you think, and what you feel. Inflammation is diagnosed as an “itis.”
Where the inflammation is discovered will determine what type of “itis” it is. An example of this is arthritis, which is inflammation of the joints. “Itis’s” are treated by the allopathic medical community with a steroid shot—like cortisone, prednisone, or the like.
Since we know that the adrenal glands use cholesterol to make cortical steroids, the question to ask is: “Why don’t my adrenal glands produce adequate amounts of their own cortisone?” The answer is that if the adrenal glands are weak or underactive in the tissue that produces these steroids, the body cannot adequately defend itself against this strong inflammation.
Lacking adequate steroids, the body then has no choice but to turn to water and electrolytes in an attempt to manage this “fire.” But water and electrolytes also cause edema (swelling) in the area of the inflammation. The liver will also begin to increase its production of cholesterol, thus giving the body additional anti-inflammatory compounds.
Cholesterol is one of the main ingredients of steroids. All of these anti-inflammatory compounds are essential to the protection of a cell against the highly damaging effects of acids. The creation of plaque occurs naturally, chemically, in an acid environment.
Alkalization is essential for the removal of this “protective shield” of plaque which itself can become a problem. Most people consume 90-100 percent acid-forming foods. Eating this way keeps the body’s pH factors acidic. The acid by-products after metabolism also add to this already over-acid condition, causing inflammation (fire), which is a killer of cells.
As stated earlier, the body, in its infinite wisdom, tries to compensate for this by several methods, including: steroid production, cholesterol (lipid) plaquing, calcium extraction, and electrolyte or fluid retention. This attempt by the body to alkalize itself is only self-preservation.
~An Excerpt from Dr. Robert Morse’s The Miracle Detox Sourcebook
How to Reduce Cholesterol Naturally in 30 Days
In essence, reducing bad cholesterol levels equates to lowering body inflammation. In my work as a health advisor, it is usually not what we consume that impacts our health the most but what we eliminate.
Simply removing the most harmful elements of our diet and lifestyle will lower the net acidic and chemical accumulation in tissues and give the body a greater opportunity to heal and rebalance.
However, by eliminating and supplementing, you can achieve more! Eliminating acidic chemistry and supplementing with alkaline chemistry will provide the body with greater hydration, nutrition, and healing power to not only lower inflammation and cholesterol levels but also have surplus energy to reverse the damage caused by diet, environment, and lifestyle over the years.
Below are very simple guidelines on how you can lower your bad cholesterol naturally in as little as 30 days with a vegan, cholesterol diet.
However, if you keep up with this protocol for at least three months, you will see profound changes not only in your cholesterol and heart health but also in your state of vitality and physical appearance!
Here is what I advise you should do to lower bad cholesterol levels without going on a limiting detoxification regimen:
Stop using conventional cosmetics, cleaning, and personal products with chemicals that you can’t pronounce; instead, substitute them with a few quality natural products that contain very few ingredients
Eat an-all fruit breakfast with organic herbal tea (nettle, thyme, juniper berries, and ginger are some of my favorite herbs for lowering inflammation)
Cut out meat, dairy, processed sugar, fast/packaged foods, as well as coffee/alcohol/cigarettes
Take a 30-45 minute walk once a day and move your body as much as possible throughout the day
Introduce more raw, alkaline foods into your diet
Lower your stress levels and emotional exertion levels significantly
Drink plenty of pure water (preferably distilled), pressed juices, and/or coconut water
Don’t eat past 7 pm
After these 30-90 days, I truly recommend that you do a liver flush and a kidney detox protocol that will strengthen these vital organs so that they will be able to detoxify and eliminate acidic waste more efficiently.
The Best Cholesterol Diet to Lower Cholesterol Quickly
When it comes down to it, it is not about eating food with low or no cholesterol, but eating acidic food in general that prompts the body to make cholesterol. Once you understand that it is about chemistry as a whole and not numbers in natural and artificial foods.
Unlike many mainstream health practitioners that advise the consumption of oils (including corn and canola!), nut butters, and beans to offset high cholesterol, I would take an opposite approach to their recommendations, since the foods they recommend are generally acidic to the body (are made up of complex proteins and chemistry that is hard for the body to digest and assimilate) and will promote greater inflammation of tissues.
Instead, what you need is hydrating and cooling chemistry – watery and nutritious foods that clean and scrub arteries and tissues, while cooling degenerated tissue. And this alkaline chemistry is mostly found in organic fruits, vegetables, and herbs.
Cleaning the body is a long-term process during which acidic chemistry is broken down, circulated, and purged from the body. That is also why it may cause the onset of certain physical symptoms to arise, including temporary skin eruptions, aches, colds, flu, and anxiety.
This is only temporary, but many individuals think these symptoms are a sign that what they’re doing is unhealthy for their bodies, and stop their healing, thinking the alkaline diet is somehow deficient. Nothing could be further from the truth.
In fact, when detoxification of acids and toxins occurs, depending on the levels of congestion and inflammation in any one individual, it is likely to experience detox symptoms as a result of “a healing crisis,” which mirrors the cellular healing and regeneration taking place in the body.
My advice is to go slow with introducing highly cleansing foods and herbs – including those listed below – into your diet, especially if you are not used to eating raw fruits and veggies on a daily basis.
Use your intuition to gauge how much you can incorporate at any given time, and slow down if you feel heavy detox symptoms. Let your body get used to and assimilate the new quality fuel you are feeding it, and simply stay consistent!
My Top Foods for Lowering Cholesterol
The following healing foods (alkaline foods) should be part of your daily cholesterol diet regimen. In fact, one of the most important healing modalities that I advise to clients with high cholesterol is to have an only-fruit breakfast, which is highly hydrating and astringent to the body.
Fruits are wonderful cleansers and they remove acids from the body before they cause inflammation and cholesterol build-up.
*Always buy organic, local, and/or ripe, if possible!
All melons
Tropical fruits
Citrus
Dates
Berries
Apples and pears
Grapes
Lemons/lime
Avocados
Beets
Celery
Bitter greens
Cucumber
Dandelion greens
Okra
Parsley/Cilantro
Alfalfa sprouts
Dulse/seaweed/kelp
Radishes
Final Thoughts
Overall, the presence of bad cholesterol in the body is a side-effect of chronic inflammation and the body’s desire to preserve its tissues and vessels from inflammatory acids.
The lipids produced by the adrenal glands are used to patch up degenerated vessels and tissues, but if they aren’t functioning properly and inflammatory chemistry keeps entering the body, the body will compensate with other emergency ways to preserve itself.
To lower bad cholesterol and eliminate it for good, no chemical drugs should be taken, since they don’t address the cause of the imbalance in the first place! On the contrary, all the body needs is cooling chemistry from alkaline foods, which will help it hydrate, detoxify acids, and regenerate tissues.
There are no shortcuts to health and no one system is independent of other systems – the body is an interrelated network of synergistic functions.
Indeed, the best vegan diet to lower cholesterol naturally is an alkaline diet made up mostly of raw, organic whole foods. By giving the body the fuel and chemistry it needs, it will, by default, always bring itself to balance and health – that is its essential blueprint.
The beauty of healing is that even when you fixate on healing one symptom or illness through your dedication to alkaline foods and herbs, you will also strengthen the body to heal all areas that are weak and could cause further health issues down the line.
If you need help with lowering your cholesterol levels, I am here for you! I offer a variety of wellness consultations, from hourly 1-1 sessions to a premier health coaching opportunities.
Comments