Ohh No, My Cholesterol Is Too Low!
Although it’s true that sugar promotes cholesterol production, and the polyunsaturated fats (PUFAs) interfere with it, restricting sugar consumption and increasing fat intake can lose its appeal when you learn about some of the problems associated with low cholesterol.
It can be a surprise to discover that there is a connection between low cholesterol levels and increased susceptibility to things like cancer, stroke and infection. And it can be even more of a shock to hear about scientific literature showing evidence of a direct, possibly causal relationship between low cholesterol and suicide, violence and even accidents.
Regardless, for many it would seem crazy to even suggest the idea that reducing fat intake (especially PUFAs) and increasing sugar consumption, is somehow related to this, and could be beneficial, and disease and stress preventative.
Cholesterol is however, one of the body’s primary anti-stress substances. It is produced largely by the liver, but a big amount is also made in the brain. Cholesterol gets converted into the highly protective hormones, such as pregnenolone, progesterone, and DHEA.
Proper thyroid metabolism is crucial for both the production of cholesterol and the subsequent conversion of cholesterol into the more specialized hormones. Under stress, when thyroid is often suppressed, cholesterol can continue to have a safeguarding role. In fact, during times of stress a reasonably healthy person will make more cholesterol as a basic form of defense.
So high cholesterol is likely to be a sign that energy metabolism is suppressed, which often means less of the highly brain-protective hormones – such as pregnenolone and progesterone – are being produced. There are many reason why thyroid energy system issues can be problematic.
It can then seem like a contradiction, when low cholesterol is also said to be associated with disease, or with the disorders of the mind. It’s only when you begin to understand the possible metabolic issues behind high as well as low cholesterol, that things can start to get a little clearer.
Both low cholesterol and high cholesterol can promote health issues, and the details and context are important.
The combination of suppressed thyroid function with low cholesterol production, however, can possibly be an indicator of very serious metabolic problems, and thus, can potentially be more dangerous than your basic low thyroid high cholesterol situation. Chances are, this is the time when protection against stress is at its lowest level, and so it seems to make sense that under these circumstances there is a higher risk of disease progression, including an increased likelihood of violent or suicidal thought and behavior.
Having low cholesterol because your body is unable to produce it in sufficient amounts – due to interfering drugs or dietary and other metabolic factors – is not at all the same as lowering cholesterol to reasonably ‘normal’ levels, by improving metabolism and health, producing enough and using or converting enough.
Very few health authorities seem to be aware of this basic physiological distinction. I’m not a doctor and I don’t give medical advice, but I have looked into this subject reasonably deeply, and I’m aware of the fact that there is a fair amount of good quality biological evidence out there which is far more logical than the official approach to this subject, and which does not appear to have been invalidated.
There is truth behind the suggestion that rising cholesterol is generally not a sign of optimal health, but sub-optimal health is not a justification for the use of harmful and potentially dangerous treatment methodologies, especially when you take a more holistic look at the available biological evidence, including evidence showing that in an aging population, high cholesterol has been demonstrated to be an accurate predictor of longevity.
There is good reason to think that the mainstream view of sugar is also not particularly well informed or accurate. Apart from assisting in the production of cholesterol, sugar consumption is important for the promotion of good thyroid metabolism. When sugar is restricted – particularly in the presence of lots of stress – glycogen stores are often quickly depleted, increasing levels of exposure to cortisol and adrenaline (and other stress substances), as well as encouraging the release of fat out of storage.
When free fatty acids are highly polyunsaturated in composition, the impact of stress – combined with sugar restriction – upon cholesterol metabolism and thyroid function, can be potentially intensified, leading to more serious issues.
Ongoing exposure to excessive amounts of PUFAs can play a big part in the promotion of the kinds of physiological conditions in which thyroid function is low and cholesterol availability is low, and the substances of stress and inflammation are rising. Metabolically speaking, this is not a good condition to be in.
PUFAs have been shown to directly interfere with digestion, promoting bacterial overgrowth and increasing endotoxin (as well as serotonin, estrogen and nitric oxide) levels. Endotoxin – and other substances of stress – can suppress thyroid metabolism and interfere with cholesterol production. All of these factors have also been shown to be able to promote the disorders of mood.
As cholesterol plays an important role in the detoxification of endotoxin (and other bowel toxins), low cholesterol can increase damage caused by exposure to endotoxin, including a greater likelihood of the liver being exposed to more stress, and becoming overloaded. Interfering with the liver can interfere with the production of cholesterol, and this can potentially then create a vicious cycle or downward spiral of worsening metabolic performance, inflammation, as well as worsening mood issues.
The relationship between low cholesterol, endotoxin, rising levels of inflammation, and increasing stress, with rising levels of violence and suicide, seems to be quite logical when observed from this perspective.
There is also a lot of evidence suggesting that the inflammatory byproducts of bacteria – including endotoxin – rather than cholesterol per se (which is inherently protective), plays an important part in the development of atherosclerosis.
This is especially true in combination with ongoing exposure to PUFAs – known to be fundamental promoters of inflammation – which can have a damaging effect on cholesterol, possibly reducing its protective capability, potentially making it harmful under certain circumstances.
Contrary to a lot of the more popular belief systems going around, levels of endotoxin, cortisol, serotonin, estrogen and nitric oxide tend to rise as a result of stress, inhibited thyroid performance, and low cholesterol availability. All of these stress substances have been demonstrated to promote inflammation, and most have been shown to be connected to violent behavior and suicidal ideation and completion.
Sugar consumption can help lower stress in general, reducing exposure to the stress hormones and related substances of inflammation and energy metabolism interference.
Bacterial endotoxin promotes serotonin and estrogen, and circulation of PUFAs can make all three more inflammatory and metabolically harmful. Thyroid and cholesterol combine to make the anti-inflammatory pro-metabolism hormones (including pregnenolone), and it would be illogical to think that this is not important information when it comes to looking at what is protective against disease and abnormal behavior.
Pregnenolone has been shown to protect against the symptoms of mental illness, including schizophrenia.
Avoiding PUFAs (including the fish oils) and restricting difficult to digest starches and fibrous materials, can help to reduce exposure to bacteria and endotoxin, as well as the other inflammatory stress substances.
This can eventually allow for an improvement in thyroid function and cholesterol production, and for improved conversion of cholesterol into the protective brain function enhancing anti-stress substances.
A diet with sufficient protein from milk, cheese and gelatin, and plenty of simple sugars from sweet ripe juicy fruits, fruit juice, white sugar and honey, is a logical approach to lowering cortisol and restricting the release of PUFAs from storage, thereby potentially improving overall metabolic function, and helping with the prevention of depression (and other mood disorders) as well as suicidality.
It is very common for a person with high cholesterol to be told to consume more of the ‘heart healthy’ PUFAs, to avoid sugar at all costs, and to take cholesterol lowering drugs. Biological texts and experiments seem to suggest that this combination is more likely to be highly stressful and anti-metabolic.
Sugar restriction, consumption of PUFAs, and popular cholesterol lowering medications, can all be seen to interfere with thyroid performance, and with the production of cholesterol, thereby damaging cellular function, promoting degenerative disease (including cancer), as well as significantly interfering with brain function.
None of what is discussed in this article is intended as medical or psychiatric advice, nor am I suggesting that the information provided here is all necessarily correct. Even if it turns out that it is, the issues discussed can be complex, and are often caused by multiple factors, many of which are not even mentioned. Get the medical help you need, and take this article for what it is. It is my opinion based on my experiences and observations, on my understanding of the work of some great scientists (in particular Dr. Ray Peat PhD), and on my comprehension of what I consider to be the most relevant, well performed and rationally argued science.
However you approach this subject, if you take a step back from the mainstream view, and look more closely at a wider range of scientific information available regarding the relationship between cholesterol and metabolic function, at the very least it should start to be easier to understand how things that promote stress (and that interfere with the natural ability of the body to effectively defend itself), can encourage degeneration and disease, and possibly lead to a higher susceptibility to dysfunctional, suicidal and violent behavior. Once you understand this, you can make better decisions, and this can then lead to better outcomes for yourself or for others.
See more here
The Risk of Acute Suicidality in Psychiatric Inpatients Increases with Low Plasma Cholesterol
Hypocholesterolemia in sepsis and critically ill or injured patients
Cholesterol and serotonin indices in depressed and suicidal patients.
Hormonal changes with cholesterol reduction: a double-blind pilot study.
Low serum cholesterol is correlated to suicidality in a Korean sample.
Serum lipid levels and suicidality: a meta-analysis of 65 epidemiological studies
Memory-enhancing effects in male mice of pregnenolone and steroids metabolically derived from it.
Low serum cholesterol in suicide attempters.
Cholesterol serum levels in violent and non-violent young male schizophrenic suicide attempters.
Serum cholesterol concentrations in parasuicide.
Suicide attempts among women during low estradiol/low progesterone states.
Metabolic features of chronic fatigue syndrome
Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors and Violent Crime: A Cohort Study
Toll-Like Receptors in the Depressed and Suicide Brain
[Severe depressive episode with psychotic symptoms on the basis of hypothyroidism].
Cortisol metabolism in depressed patients and healthy controls.
Why May Allopregnanolone Help Alleviate Loneliness?
Prevalence of anxiety and depressive symptoms among patients with hypothyroidism
Endotoxin, Toll-like Receptor-4, and Atherosclerotic Heart Disease.
Low serum cholesterol in violent but not in non-violent suicide attempters.
Lipophilic statin use and suicidal ideation in a sample of adults with mood disorders.
Cholesterol and the “Cycle of Violence” in attempted suicide.
Mood, Personality, and Behavior Changes During Treatment with Statins: A Case Series
Suicidal Behavior in Schizophrenia may be Related to Low Lipid Levels
Serum cholesterol level: is it a marker of sepsis?
Low serum cholesterol may be associated with suicide attempt history.
Serum cholesterol concentration and death from suicide in men: Paris prospective study I.
Effects of Estrogen on Aggressive Behavior
The antiviral effector IFITM3 disrupts intracellular cholesterol homeostasis to block viral entry
Is low total cholesterol levels associated with suicide attempt in depressive patients?
Cholesterol concentrations in violent and non-violent women suicide attempters.
Whole blood serotonin relates to violence in an epidemiological study.
Plasma total cholesterol in psychiatric patients after a suicide attempt and in follow-up.
Increased plasma nitric oxide metabolites in suicide attempters.
Total serum cholesterol in relation to psychological correlates in parasuicide.
Cholesterol content in brains of suicide completers.
The role of inflammation in suicidal behaviour
Assessing possible hazards of reducing serum cholesterol.
Cholesterol and violence: is there a connection?
Cholesterol and psychological well-being.
Decline in serum total cholesterol and the risk of death from cancer.
A Randomized, Double-Blind, Placebo-Controlled Trial of Pregnenolone for Bipolar Depression
Mechanism Linking Aggression Stress through Inflammation to Cancer
Mice Genetically Depleted of Brain Serotonin do not Display a Depression-like Behavioral Phenotype
Low serum cholesterol concentration and short term mortality from injuries in men and women.
High cholesterol may protect against infections and atherosclerosis
The endotoxin-lipoprotein hypothesis.
Is low cholesterol a risk factor for cancer mortality?
Low serum LDL cholesterol levels and the risk of fever, sepsis, and malignancy.
Antidepressants and murder: case not closed
Cholesterol loss during glutamate-mediated excitotoxicity
The statin-low cholesterol-cancer conundrum
Hypocholesterolemia in sepsis and critically ill or injured patients
Epidemiological link between low cholesterol and suicidality: a puzzle never finished.
Rapid Effects of Estradiol on Aggression in Birds and Mice: The Fast and the Furious
Health Policy on Blood Cholesterol
Serum cholesterol and risk of cancer in a cohort of 39,000 men and women.
Low lipid concentrations in critical illness: implications for preventing and treating endotoxemia.
Low plasma cholesterol predicts an increased risk of lung cancer in elderly women.
Low cholesterol and risk of non-coronary mortality.
LOW LDL CHOLESTEROL IS RELATED TO CANCER RISK
Acute cholesterol responses to mental stress and change in posture.
Total Serum Cholesterol and Cancer Incidence in the Metabolic Syndrome and Cancer Project (Me-Can)
#cholesterolprotects
#sugarsaves
#raypeat
Image: Healthagy: “How to Keep Your Cholesterol in Check During Thanksgiving”