Cholesterol meds compatible w/bf'ing

I have just learned that my cholesterol is high (250, yikes) and I have been
given 3 months to do diet modifications and exercise to lower it. The doc
wants me to go on medication but I need to know which ones are compatible
with breastfeeding. Anyone?

TIA.

CY

"CY" wrote in message
news:Fk2Og.141936$FQ1.7058@attbi_s71...
I have just learned that my cholesterol is high (250, yikes) and I have
been given 3 months to do diet modifications and exercise to lower it. The
doc wants me to go on medication but I need to know which ones are
compatible with breastfeeding. Anyone?

Just three months? Yeah, right.

Jess

What? Is that unrealistic? I know NOTHING about cholesterol...
"Jess" wrote in message
news:6n5Og.230647$k%3.72998@dukeread12...

"CY" wrote in message
news:Fk2Og.141936$FQ1.7058@attbi_s71...
I have just learned that my cholesterol is high (250, yikes) and I have
been given 3 months to do diet modifications and exercise to lower it.
The doc wants me to go on medication but I need to know which ones are
compatible with breastfeeding. Anyone?

Just three months? Yeah, right.

Jess

When my husband had cholesterol issues he was given 6 months before
re-testing. He never did need meds, just started eating better (whole
grains, oatmeal, few sat & trans fats, lots of fruits & veggies...) and
walking more and got it down himself.

I would hold off on the meds and see if you can lower it through diet
and exercise first. Then in 3 months maybe re-test. If it is lower
then then, don't get meds as you will be able to get it down yourself.
If it is higher then obviously you need meds. I would think your Doc
would know which meds are okay for breastfeeding though.

Just my opinions, I rarely rarely take medicine though. I just don't
like the unknowns...

KR

CY wrote:
What? Is that unrealistic? I know NOTHING about cholesterol...
"Jess" wrote in message
news:6n5Og.230647$k%3.72998@dukeread12...

"CY" wrote in message
news:Fk2Og.141936$FQ1.7058@attbi_s71...
I have just learned that my cholesterol is high (250, yikes) and I have
been given 3 months to do diet modifications and exercise to lower it.
The doc wants me to go on medication but I need to know which ones are
compatible with breastfeeding. Anyone?

Just three months? Yeah, right.

Jess

"CY" wrote in message news:tO6Og.48662$aJ.37010@attbi_s21...
What? Is that unrealistic? I know NOTHING about cholesterol...

You want a fast and sloppy crash course in it?

And yes, I'm of the opinion that three months is unrealistic to get your
numbers into the range your doctor probably wants. I think it's realistic to
see an *improvement* in three months, but that's it.

But. IANAD. I can give you a sloppy crash course, some hints and suggestions
and Kate and..*name blank* can catch me if I'm wrong.

Jess

Yes, I should have clarified - doc wants to see an improvement in 3 mths,
but I don't know how much. I just assumed she'd want the numbers below 200,
but I have NO idea how quickly you can make the numbers go down. All I
really know is that I should avoid food with cholesterol, and trans fat.
And eat oatmeal. That's IT! So quick and sloppy crash course would be
great, thank you!

CY
"Jess" wrote in message
news:suiOg.230662$k%3.228941@dukeread12...

"CY" wrote in message
news:tO6Og.48662$aJ.37010@attbi_s21...
What? Is that unrealistic? I know NOTHING about cholesterol...

You want a fast and sloppy crash course in it?

And yes, I'm of the opinion that three months is unrealistic to get your
numbers into the range your doctor probably wants. I think it's realistic
to see an *improvement* in three months, but that's it.

But. IANAD. I can give you a sloppy crash course, some hints and
suggestions and Kate and..*name blank* can catch me if I'm wrong.

Jess

"CY" wrote in message
news:vvrOg.968950$084.193693@attbi_s22...
Yes, I should have clarified - doc wants to see an improvement in 3 mths,
but I don't know how much. I just assumed she'd want the numbers below
200, but I have NO idea how quickly you can make the numbers go down. All
I really know is that I should avoid food with cholesterol, and trans fat.
And eat oatmeal. That's IT! So quick and sloppy crash course would be
great, thank you!

An improvement in three months isn't unrealistic. 250 isn't horrendous-the
goal might be to get you under about 200.

Um.

The sloppy answer is that cholesterol is a form of fat, and there are three
forms of it: the high density stuff and the low density stuff. It's those
numbers plus triglycerides (an entirely different form of fat) that get
counted in your total cholesterol level. Generally, the higher your number,
the more nervous your doctor gets about heart problems and diabetes because
there's a correlation between high cholesterol, heart problems and diabetes.

The main place you get the bad cholesterol is from animal sources. If it
comes from an animal, it's got the bad cholesterol (which, incidentally, is
the low density type and is the worse of the two). Milk, eggs, cheese,
chicken, beef, ice cream, egg pasta, you get the idea. The easy way to
remember it: if it tastes good, it's got the bad cholesterol. You also
want to watch out for really processed foods-the stuff that's got high
fructose corn syrup or some form of hydrogenated oil as the second
ingredient. That'll spike your triglycerides.

You can also get cholesterol from non-animal sources: beans, unsalted
peanuts, legumes, fish, shellfish. This stuff will get you the better type
(the high density and healthier of the pair) of cholesterol and will get you
some fatty acids that'll help protect your heart while you're at it.

You also want to do other things that soak up cholesterol before it gets a
chance to get absorbed. Any type of whole wheat brown bread/pasta,
fruit/veggie stuff, salads with lots of romaine lettuce and tomatoes and
carrots and not so much of the dressing and cheese. What this stuff does is
bind with the cholesterol you get in the rest of your meal and keeps it from
making its' way into your system. It also fills you up faster so you eat
less meat, which is good since meat is so spendy.

What I did was drag out the crockpot and dive into some vegetarian recipes.
I also fedged some of my other recipes so I'm making up six quarts of
chicken stew with a quarter pound of meat. I've got oatmeal and Cheerios in
the house, and we get the Sara Lee multigrain bread. I also usually don't
buy egg noodles-I try to stick to whole grain or yolkless stuff . We make up
salad while dinner's cooking and have a salad and we've halved our meat bill
that way. The only thing I fry here is mushrooms-it'll be a cold day in hell
before we give up our sauteed mushrooms. But we do a lot of grilling,
baking, broiling, searing, roasting. Not so much on the gravies. I've got a
Fannie Farmer's cookbook and a Better Homes & Gardens crockpot cookbook.
Both of those have vegetarian/meatless recipe sections. There're also a
couple of mags out there (diabetic cooking and one other) that do some
really good cooking. For salads, we still use dressing, but we pour the
dressing into one of my ramekins and use it from a ramekin. Celery sticks
with peanut butter causes a riot here;. So do cold apples. Bananas over
cheerios. Sproglette turns into Piglet over peaches and DB will snack on
grapes all day long. Triscuits instead of Lays. Do a handful of triscuits
with some sliced tomatoes and cheese. Those're good. Use olive oil instead
of corn oil for cooking and use cooking spray for greasing baking pans.
Garlic, too. Something about garlic that helps with cholesterol.

That help?

Jess

"CY" wrote in message
news:vvrOg.968950$084.193693@attbi_s22...
Yes, I should have clarified - doc wants to see an improvement in 3 mths,
but I don't know how much. I just assumed she'd want the numbers below
200,
but I have NO idea how quickly you can make the numbers go down.

I gave up meat (beef, chicken, pork) for Lent this year (which is 40 days
long) and went from 225 to 198. My doctor was very happy. YMMV.