Blood work
A few weeks ago, I visited the doctor for the first time in many, many years. Beth had begged me to get a physical, and it had been a long time, so I went in to find out what kinds of horrors I'd been inflicting upon my body. I had inadvertently fasted, so at the end of the physical itself, I was sent to a lab to get bloodwork done. My dad had a heart attack and a subsequent quadruple bypass at age 48. He doesn't drink, but he did smoke heavily up until that time, and he was slightly overweight. This was enough for the doctor to want to know my cholesterol levels.
The blood work came back and I found out today what I suspected: eating fast food isn't a way to stay healthy. It was explained to me that there are essentially 4 readings for your cholesterol: overall, triglycerides (TG), LDL (bad cholesterol) and HDL (good cholesterol). Good values for those 4 are <200, <150, <100 and >40. My readings were 250, 222, 169 and 44. These are, apparently, "really bad". ;-)
So for the next 6 weeks, I'm going to try and affect change by eating significantly better, and then get tested again to see how much of my problem is genetic vs. my crappy eating habits. I think it could go either way, based on my dad's health. I'm not overweight and I don't smoke, so that's good. On the other hand, work has been a bit more stressful overall since I moved to Aspyr, and that can't be helped.
I'm not anxious to start taking medication to regulate this, so I'll keep my fingers crossed that eating better will do the trick. For those of you with stock in Wendy's, now is a good time to sell. ;-)
Comments
Have you seen the movie Super Size Me? It'll put you off fast food for life -- certainly did for me.
Posted by: Richard Bannister | December 2, 2004 02:10 AM
A great way to help yourself out is to buy chicken breasts from costco, the individually wrapped ones. Keep two in the fridge cold box at all times, cook them night before and bag them up for lunch. Throw a salad in there and your golden at work.
Posted by: Andrew Machado | December 2, 2004 02:13 AM
My Dad had a bypass a few years ago, which was undertaken at The John Radcliffe Hospital, Oxford, England. Since then we've adjusted our diets and feel a lot better for it.
Posted by: John Hood | December 2, 2004 02:43 AM
I had pretty high cholesterol numbers a couple of years ago, and my doctor told me I needed to lower them.
I cut down on fast food, used lower fat foods and less of the high fat foods, plus took Omega 3 supplements (which helps with the cholesterol) and dropped my levels back down to where they belonged. As a bonus, I lost 40 pounds.
Plus, I generally felt better not eating a steady diet of fast food. But I allowed myself some goodies on a limited basis, so I wouldn't go insane.
Beats dying. Unless you can die spectacularly. Like jumping a motorcycle across 50 flaming buses or something. That would be a cool way to go.
Posted by: Nathan Strum | December 2, 2004 04:22 AM
I went to the doc a few years ago and got the same diagnosis. I was on various meds but the single biggest factor in changing the numbers (aside from the meds) was physical activity. I started taking 1-2 hour hikes in the local mountains on weekends, that helped but I was inconsistent. But now I walk to work. 30 mins there, and 30 back, 5 days a week. By far this simple level of constant/regular activity did wonders for me. I tried to modify my diet, though I didn't have a particularly high fast food habit. I'm going to try the Omega 3 supplements, but with flax oil rather than fish oil.
So, check out your food intake but also see if there a physical activity (it doesn't have to be strenuous) that you can do that is regular and sustained.
Posted by: Garth | December 2, 2004 08:54 AM
Please be sure to let me know how you pull off this feat. My triglycerides were high a few weeks ago (not unusual in diabetics like myself, but a high risk factor for heart attack and stroke), and frankly, since I haven't behaved very well I'm a bit afraid to get them retested.
Posted by: suellen | December 2, 2004 09:04 AM
Really, fast food will be the death of all of us. It is terrible for you, but oh so tempting! Frankly though, I want to be old and cranky, so I force myself to be good. Good luck with all of this Brad! Just promise you won't go all Atkins on us or something!
Posted by: rpg | December 2, 2004 01:39 PM
Brad, sorry to hear about your high cholesterol, Fast Food bad...Chipotle good...
I always like to look at the bright side of things, so here goes.
1. Now you have the opportunity to create your own diet, "The MacGamer's Diet"...Imagine the loads of money you'll make of the book sales. And you're better looking than Jarrod!
2. Someone above suggested exercise, now if anyone knows you, they know that you have absolutely no idea what that word means...heck its Greek to you. So let me break it down for you...walk, run, bike, or heck, you're from Oklahoma...why don't you start wrestling! Heck, you even know ASU's assistant coach, and I'm sure he'd let you workout with the team. This way you'd either be in great shape or die in some spectacular fashion (also suggested above)!
3. You surely have lower numbers than Paul or me...wait a minute...that means we'll have to go to the doctor now...grrrrhhh...how do I erase this...my delete/backspace keys don't work...darn Windows machine.
Posted by: Jason Simpson | December 2, 2004 06:46 PM
Hey! I heard that! My cholesterol just came in at 211 ("usual clinical range" of 140-199), HDL at 44 (35-80) and LDL at 147 (0-129). Chol/HDL = 4.8 (<5.0) and LDL/HDL = 3.35 (0.9-5.3).
A little high, but you can still bite me.
Posted by: Paul | December 7, 2004 07:53 PM
I tend to eat alot of fast food too. I'm just too gutless to see the doc. Mostly doctors annoy me because all they ever do is perscribe me VERY expensive medication for my health problems. I'm a poor college student! freak!
Anyway, Brad... how bout some comments on the GameSpy situation? Gosh, this situation has ruined my whole week... If World of Warcraft hadn't come along, it would have ruined my whole life :) j/k
Posted by: Glen | December 10, 2004 09:47 AM
Too late...read this post after ordering from Wendy's...next time I'll buy a salad!
Good luck with your *new* eating habits.
Posted by: Ricardo | December 21, 2004 11:36 AM
Sound's a lot like what happened a year ago when I went to the physician.
Watch out for medication. My doctor put me on Pravachol, which did not help all that much, and had nasty side effects.
Change in diet, change in exercise helps more, and is probably more sustainable. I do suggest the fish oil capsules, and add a bowl or two of oat bran to you diet every day. (It keeps you from eating other junk, and it does help keep fats from absorption.)
One other point - do not try to cut out fat entirely. Instead, try to find extremely flavorful fats that provide a lot of flavor for the fat content. A teaspoon of olive oil can often make a dish feel very rich, when it is actually lean.
Good luck - it is not easy to change lifestyles, and most physicians do not recognize just how hard the effort is.
Posted by: Scott Ellsworth | January 20, 2005 12:58 PM