It's a shock, isn't it? I thought I knew what to expect...hot flashes, emotional moments, weight gain, gray hair. Mammograms and bone marrow scans.
But there's a lot more to it than that, I'm learning.
Started off with the routine blood work. Granted, I hadn't had all the numbers run for about three years, but I didn't expect any shocks.
Got one; my cholesterol, they said, was two points into the red zone. They wanted to put me on statin drugs.
Hold on, I said. The last time my cholesterol was checked the doctor commented on how excellent my numbers were. Can I do some diet-and-exercise first?
Sure, the nurse said. But we want to recheck in six weeks. (It doesn't help that our family doctor moved and his replacement doesn't...as of last notice...take our insurance yet. So we're between doctors at the moment).
So I watched...really watched what I ate. We walked five or six times a week. Consumed oatmeal and omega-3 seafood.
I didn't expect a dramatic change, but I figured I'd knock it down a couple of points so I wasn't in the 'high risk' zone anymore. Besides, I remembered eating bacon sandwiches the night before the first test.
So, two days into a church fast (I was doing juice, water, and protein shakes!) I went back for the next blood test.
The shock was three days later when they called to inform me that both my LDL and total cholesterol numbers had gone up!
I was flabbergasted. Doing everything right...and it still went up.
On a whim, I googled 'correlation between menopause and high cholesterol'.
Boom. First page. Found out that there is a definite change in blood chemistry that results in elevated cholesterol and high blood pressure.
And was reminded again that heart disease is the leading cause of death in women over the age of 50.
Humble Pie time. I've heard that forever, it seems, but it didn't really register. I thought that was because women just kind of lost the motivation to maintain good eating/exercise habits as they got older...and I considered coronary problems as just part of growing older; things wearing out. Now, I see myself having to deal with the 'old people' problems of high cholesterol and such, even though I've tried at least some to keep moving and eat reasonably.
So I'm taking the medicine, even though I don't like all the side effects it warns me to be concerned about (how on earth do I know the difference between medicine induced 'muscle pain' and the run-of-the-mill-I'm-50-for-crying-out-loud 'muscle pain'?), because...what other options are there? If diet and exercise did less than nothing to control it, what's left?
At least there's a silver lining...between avoiding foods that aggravate acid reflux AND are fatty, I've lost five pounds. ;)
I'm willing to bet that losing a few pounds in itself will lower your numbers. I had the same thing happen, and then it went down w/o meds. 'Course, I haven't had it checked for a couple years. Olive oil and grape juice, etc. Just keep working it. My doctor back then told me there was no way short of running marathons for exercise to raise the HDL, but mine did go up a bit with steady walking. Six weeks isn't a very long time.
ReplyDeleteWelcome to the club.