Why we crave? EMOTIONAL EATING NOT NUTRITIONALLY!

fat helps to suppress emotions

That's actually an excellent question!

The reason is this: most carnivores have physical adaptations for catching and eating prey. Lions (and other big cats) are big, strong, and have teeth and claws for seizing and killing prey. Spotted hyenas have amazing endurance and the strongest jaws of any large animal. Snakes have venom and/or the ability to coil and crush their prey, and the ability to hide in ambush just about anywhere. Sharks, wolves, crocodiles...the list goes on and on, and it's easy to name the physical adaptations natural selection has produced in each.

In contrast, our australopithecine ancestors had no such physical adaptations! They were smaller, weaker, slower, and inferior in every physical way to the existing predatory species, with two key exceptions:

1. Bipedalism
2. Opposable thumbs

This allowed us to make and use tools, a process which began at least 2.6 million years ago (click for article), and which obviously placed a premium on both intelligence and the capacity to learn. We didn't need big teeth to tear meat from bones: we needed the intelligence to make and use sharp rocks. We didn't need to be large or powerful in order to tackle and bring down prey: we needed to throw rocks accurately, and later spears. And so on.

JS

Newsletter signup is on the right sidebar, under "Gnolls In Your Inbox".  Type your email there, and make sure to click the link in the confirmation email you'll receive.  If you don't see the confirmation email, check your spam folder.

JS

Pescetarian paleo is a perfectly reasonable and healthy way to eat.  Don't forget about shellfish, as they're Nature's multivitamin/multimineral supplement.

Happy holidays to you and yours, too!

JS

Thanks for those links. I'll be looking at all of them. Btw, I still eat fish. Its the one thing I refuse to give up. The fish oil supplements are a safe (no mercury) source of omega-3 but I still love eating salmon.

p.s. I *will* be eating turkey this Christmas! ;o)

Merry Christmas & Happy New Year.

Rob

Meds for 198 TC is insane.  240 TC is right on the lowest-risk part of the curve.  Some numbers here:

http://perfecthealthdiet.com/2011/06/blood-lipids-and-infectious-disease-part-i/

I've seen several more papers confirming the U-shaped association for men, and a negative association for women (higher cholesterol = lower mortality risk, with no upper limit, for women).  Here's one: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21951982

...but TC is a far worse predictor than the TG/HDL ratio, which is about the best you can do with the numbers you get from a standard "cholesterol test".  Lower is better, e.g.:

High ratio of triglycerides to hdl-cholesterol predicts extensive coronary disease

http://www.scielo.br/scielo.php?pid=S1807-59322008000400003&script=sci_arttext

(Actually measured via Freisinger index. Note that TC was not a significant predictor!)

Fasting Triglycerides, High-Density Lipoprotein, and Risk of Myocardial Infarction

http://circ.ahajournals.org/content/96/8/2520.long

(7x greater risk of MI for highest vs. lowest quartile of TG/HDL)

Men are also more likely to survive a stroke with high cholesterol than low. Boatloads of studies here:

http://healthydietsandscience.blogspot.com/search/label/Cholesterol%20and%20Stroke

Low cholesterol is also linked to dementia, etc.:

http://healthydietsandscience.blogspot.com/search/label/Cholesterol%20and%20Alzheimers

http://healthydietsandscience.blogspot.com/search/label/Cholesterol%20and%20Dementia

Dr. Malcolm Kendrick writes about this stuff quite a bit, too: http://drmalcolmkendrick.org

As far as fish oil, eating fatty fish themselves (salmon, mackerel, sardines) will generally be a better source than the capsules, but they're better than nothing.  Mainly it's important to decrease n-6 intake, and removing "vegetable oils" (seed oils) is a great start.  

I wish you the best on your journey.

JS

My TC maxed out at 236mg/dl in 2007. I say "maxed out". It could have gone higher but I switched to a low-fat vegetarian diet because of reasons stated earlier. My doctor at the time did not seem overly concerned about because there were no other risk factors. Today my TC is 198 BUT I also have high BP and I had a positive stress test. I recently had a nuclear stress test to a) rule out the possibility that the previous stress test was a false positive and b) see if there are any areas of concern regarding blood flow to the heart. Still awaiting the results from that. On a Paleo-style diet I did feel better than I did on the Atkins diet. Perhaps the Paleo would be a better compromise. My current doctor would probably not recommend any diet that would raise my cholesterol however. He wants me on meds for both cholesterol (for a TC of 198!!!) and for my BP, which I've been trying natural methods with some degree of success. I remember reading something about how lowering one's cholesterol beyond a certain age (I'm 58) does not equate to better health. In fact, it can lead to decreased cognitive function and poorer health in general. Have you seen anything regarding this? Rather than go on meds, which I've been avoiding, I'd rather address the cause than the symptoms. I've heard good things about fish oil's ability to fight inflammation in the body so I'm looking at getting a quality, high-dose, molecularly distilled (mercury removed) fish oil supplement. I've also cut out all vegetable oils from my diet.

Sounds like you were definitely ketogenic, or at least VLC.  That doesn't work for everybody.

Keep in mind that your "cholesterol test" (which actually measures lipoproteins) will show a big bold "HIGH" at over 200 -- however, multiple data sets show that minimum mortality for men is around 240 TC, with TC<200 being just as bad as TC > 280.  So while high cholesterol has an association with heart disease, "high" is a lot higher than most people think.

Also, consider that 20% carbs is a lot different from "leafy greens only", which will put you in VLC/keto territory unless you're cheating with a lot of sugary condiments.  That's where I tend to live (though I don't count or measure), because I lose weight on VLC even when I don't want to!

That being said, you have to eat what works best for you.  Just be careful with vitamin deficiencies if you're eating vegetarian AND low-fat: it's tough to get A (not beta-carotene), K2, B12, biotin, etc. unless you're willing to eat egg yolks and butter.

JS