Taking leadership of your heart health is key to longevity and vitality. In this episode, I provide a framework for heart health beyond the conventional model that is reliant upon medications.
Taking leadership of your heart health is a key to longevity and vitality. In this episode, I provide a framework for heart health beyond the conventional model that is reliant upon medications.
Heart disease is the number one killer of women in the U.S. and is the leading cause of death globally. The conventional model relies upon medications to manage blood pressure and cholesterol. If you are willing to take leadership over your heart health, lifestyle and stress management modalities can change the trajectory of your heart health.
When it comes to taking lifelong blood pressure medications, my advice is to question if you want to be on medication for the rest of your life and alternatives for balancing blood pressure. that protocol. Research supports health coaching as a viable option to positively impact blood pressure without medication. I provide specific nutrient and mineral deficiencies to consider. Additionally, HeartMath® breathing techniques and LifeWave’s light therapy patches support heart health.
It’s important to understand cholesterol beyond the traditional simplified labs that measure HDL, LDL, and the ratio between the two. In this episode, we take a deep dive into cholesterol and its role in healthy hormone production for peri and menopausal women.
I introduce ApoB, which is an important marker if you have high LDL. ApoBis a protein that plays a crucial role in lipid metabolism and cardiovascular health. If ApoB levels are too high, statins may be prescribed. Stains block an enzyme in the liver called Coenzyme Q10. I then review the many potential and likely side effects of statins, again encouraging lifestyle shifts as an alternative.
Lastly, I give my top tip for what to address first for heart disease or metabolic chaos and then wrap up with my three-part framework for a heart healthy lifestyle.
A heartfelt thanks to listener cocofrosty7, who left the show a glowing review of Vitally You®: “Trailblazer in wellness, always ahead of the curve when it comes to wellness, and thought-provoking wisdom and guidance.” Your review is deeply appreciated, cocofrosty7, and all reviews as they help keep the podcast going.
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Dana Frost 00:07
Welcome to Vitally You, a podcast created to introduce you to the tools that will be your roadmap for feeling younger while growing older. I'm your host Dana Frost, a wellness expert, life coach and energy medicine practitioner. Here's what you can expect conversations about vitality from the inside out with guest experts in the field of health, culture, and spirituality, and solo episodes along the way from me where I do deep dives into the topics of aging, heart intelligence, energy, medicine, and your innate capacity to heal. If you want to feel younger, while growing older, this is the place for you.
Dana Frost 00:53
Hi, everyone. Welcome to the Vitally You Podcast. I'm Dana Frost, your host, and in today's episode, I'm going to share the first three things I look at when it comes to heart health. Now I want to provide a necessary disclaimer, I'm not a doctor, and this is not meant to be medical advice. Now, my apologies for not delivering this episode in February as promised, to be honest, it was a challenging episode due to the nuances in heart health. Plus, I recognize it's taking me longer to do all the things I've done in the past, and I ended up coaching myself as I would coach you, and I settled into a softer rhythm without judgment.
Dana Frost 01:37
So instead of working against what was actually working for me, I just said, "Okay, I surrender." I hope that's cool with you that this episode is coming to you three weeks late. I would love to hear from you. Are you feeling yourself differently than years past? Are you experiencing time and productivity differently? I'm really curious, I always love to hear from the listener. So let me know what's happening for you where time and productivity is concerned.
Dana Frost 02:09
During today's episode, when I say conventional doctor or medical community, I'm referring to the health care you receive and is most likely paid through your insurance policy. If I use the word allopathic, I'm also referring to the system of medical practice that emphasizes diagnosing and treating disease with the use of therapeutic measures like drugs and surgery. So conventional doctor allopathic, I'm referring to the same system of diagnostics and treating disease with therapeutic measures such as drugs and surgery.
Dana Frost 02:46
Okay, so we are going to start today's episode off with the elephant in the room. Heart disease is the number one killer of women in the US, and globally, heart disease is the leading cause of death. I heard someone say what is the first symptom of heart disease? And you know the answer to that question, the first symptom of heart disease? The answer was death. Heart disease is a silent killer because there are symptoms happening internally that we are not recognizing, and that's why this is a really important conversation for us to have. If we want to talk about feeling younger, while growing older, we have to talk about the elephant in the room that heart disease is the number one killer of women.
Dana Frost 03:48
Now, I've been attempting to understand my own risk for heart disease. Number one, because I have an arrhythmia and that's why I have a pacemaker I have bradycardia. Number two, I have a family history of heart disease, and number three, over the past a year, my annual labs show an increased risk for heart disease that I've had to dial into and understand better, and I'm going to bring you what I've learned in today's episode. But as I said, heart health is super nuanced, and you don't want to take it lightly.
Dana Frost 04:25
Where heart health is concerned, it's really important to seek guidance from a doctor who has experience and a track record in helping patients manage heart health. I am going to give you a lot of resources on today's podcast so please stay tuned for the full episode. I think this is going to be a longer than normal episode and true confessions: I recorded this episode and had a tech fail. And so this is my second recording and the first recording was about 45 minutes long. So let's see, strap yourself in and let's get going.
Dana Frost 05:06
So my goal for today's conversation is to give you a framework, there are going to be three main things that I'm going to bring us back to at the end of the episode, and I want those three things to be your starting point. I cannot address every heart condition, there are many. That's part of the reason I got a little bit overwhelmed as I was preparing, I mean, I really truly have worked all month on this episode. It just took me a long time to come to the conversation that's going to actually be beneficial to you.
Dana Frost 05:39
So there are many heart conditions arrhythmia that's mine eye bradycardia, blood pressure, blood clots, plaque, angina, heart murmur enlarged heart. The most common conditions are blood pressure, and cholesterol. These are primarily treated with medications from the conventional or allopathic medical model. My framework looks at lifestyle modifications and stress management.
Dana Frost 06:03
First, what I want to do, I want to share a few simple strategies for brought blood pressure before we get into cholesterol because I've seen the blood pressure issue with a lot of clients. And I feel like this is, I don't want to say an easy thing to take care of, but it's it's easy your to address. It's not as nuanced.
Dana Frost 06:26
Okay, so with blood pressure, most doctors are going to prescribe medications and they are going to tell you settle in, you're going to be on them for the rest of your life. And I want you to ask yourself the question, Is that what you want for your future? I want you to question the prevailing medical recommendations. You can lower your blood pressure without medications. Now, as I said, I'm not a doctor, I'm not giving medical advice. But I'm asking you to think about what is it that you really want for your future.
Dana Frost 06:57
Now, if you don't want to be on medication, this is the key, you have to take ownership of your health, you have to be willing to make the necessary upgrades to your lifestyle, and it is a commitment that requires you to step out of the model that is based on a pill for every ailment. It takes determination to make the necessary lifestyle changes because the lifestyle changes, they're going to mess with the intimate people in your life, they are going to mess with your routine, they're going to mess with a thing that you need to do for sustenance, which is eat. They're going to challenge your unconscious patterns, and the unconscious stressors that are underneath the surface that maybe you aren't seeing.
Dana Frost 07:43
What I can tell you that I think is really interesting when it comes to blood pressure is that there is scientific evidence in PubMed. It's a paper that shows that health coaching actually is an effective solution for getting your blood pressure under control. I will put the link to that research on the show notes. When you are looking at blood pressure, I want you to look at your vitamin D levels. Our vitamin D levels are chronically low, we are not getting enough sunshine, the best way to synthesize vitamin D is sun on the skin. So I want you to look at your vitamin D levels, I want you to look at your potassium levels. Potassium is a mineral that carries a charge. So often people think of it as an electrolyte, but it is a mineral. And you want to look at the potassium levels. And you also do want to look at your electrolytes. So so many people say oh eliminate salt, if you have high blood pressure and this is woefully misguided, you really need to have the right balance of minerals and electrolytes.
Dana Frost 08:55
So I would ask you to go deeper than just eliminating salt but I would ask you to choose your salt wisely. You want a mineralized sea salt, so a living salt that can actually be utilized by your body. When we think about blood pressure We do want to look at food and many doctors missed this but the standard American diet which is heavy in processed foods, so if you're on a standard American diet, and you're eating a lot of processed foods, this is the number one thing you should do to lower your blood pressure is go to a whole foods diet. These are the foods that would be good for normalizing blood pressure swiss chard, spinach, avocado, sweet potato, bok choy, potato, white beans, beets, those are a few of the foods that you could look at.
Dana Frost 09:46
High blood pressure is very common in people who are obese or overweight. So you want definitely want to be looking at that with high blood pressure. You want to be looking at stress So, we know that the research out of Heart Math shows that practicing the Heart Math, the scientific breathing techniques, lower heart rate, and I will put the research link mean, there's a lot but I'll put one research link in the show notes. I had a client in my health mastermind who started practicing Heart Math and our coaching and She lowered her blood pressure. And it was she was so impressed by this that she decided to study HeartMath® and become certified so that she could share HeartMath® with the people in her attorney mastermind with those clients of hers because it was so such a powerful experience in being able to experience for herself the lowering of her blood pressure simply by using the HeartMath® breathing techniques.
Dana Frost 10:52
So the other thing that I can mention where blood pressure was concerned is that there are many, many, many testimonials using life waves, light therapy patches to lower blood pressure symptoms, you can contact me if you would like to learn more information. lifewave as a company, we don't treat diagnoses or diseases. But we do treat symptoms and so you can treat the symptoms of blood pressure with the patches, there is a protocol that probably an acupuncture is created. And many many people have found the benefit of using the patches to normalize their blood pressure. As you know, it was my arrhythmia that got me interested in HeartMath®. And going back to HeartMath®, and next week episode I am going to dive in to HeartMath®, and the interesting connection and intersection between heart rate variability and your nervous system and using the HeartMath® breathing techniques to harmonize your nervous system and to bring coherence throughout your whole system using simple breathing techniques.
Dana Frost 12:06
So we are going to move into the conversation about cholesterol. As patients our conventional doctors primarily use cholesterol and blood pressure, they check your blood pressure to determine heart health and our yearly checkups. That simple test the lipid panel that measures total cholesterol, LDL and HDL and the ratio of the two is woefully inadequate in determining true heart health.
Dana Frost 12:35
So what is cholesterol? It is a natural steroid that is a precursor to hormone production. What does that mean? We need cholesterol to produce hormones. It's a waxy fat like substance found in your body cells and food. It is an essential component of cell membranes, and it's used to produce hormones, as I said, like estrogen and progesterone, vitamin D and bile acids that aid in digestion. While your body needs some cholesterol to function properly high levels in the blood can increase the risk of heart disease and stroke. So cholesterol is carried through the bloodstream by lipoproteins, including LDL or low density lipoproteins and HDL, high density lipo protein.
Dana Frost 13:22
During my health crisis in 2011 My doctor was really concerned about my high cholesterol, and he alarmed me and then when all about subtle that I made it back to my holistic doctor, he was not at all like I went to him and I was I've got this problem I have high cholesterol helped me with it. He was not at all concerned about my cholesterol level. He taught me that it's protective, especially in Perry and menopausal women. Because why it goes back to cholesterol is a precursor for estrogen and testosterone. And what happens during perimenopause and menopause, is that the sex organs produce less of those sex hormones. And so we need cholesterol to be one of the backbone producers of these hormones for us. So these lipoproteins, LDL, HDL, they carry passengers between organs, tissues and the liver. Passengers like cholesterol, triglycerides and phospho lipids.
Dana Frost 14:29
What are triglycerides? Triglycerides are a type of fat or lipid found in the blood. When you eat your body converts any calories it doesn't need to use right away into triglycerides and the triglycerides are stored in your fat cells. Later hormones released triglycerides for energy between meals. If you regularly eat more calories than you burn, particularly easy calories like carbohydrates and fats. You may have high triglycerides. We'll talk more about triglycerides.
Dana Frost 15:02
But first, what are phospholipids? It's another passenger phospholipids are a type of lipid or fat molecule that serve important purposes in the body. They serve cellular structure, properties purposes, cell signaling, energy storage and emulsification. From a cellular structure phospho lipids are a major component of cell membranes, which enclose and protect the contents of cells, they form a double layer called the phospho lipid by labor, or hydrophilic. Water attracting which means water retracting. I feel like that's getting a little bit into the weeds. But let's just say that phospholipids are made they it's a part of the structure of the cell membrane and they're protective.
Dana Frost 15:49
Okay, cell signaling phospholipids can act as a signaling molecule that transmit messages within and between cells. They help communication they're involved in growth, metabolism and responses to hormones and neurotransmitters. cell signaling very important. One of the purposes is energy storage phospho. Lipids can store energy in the form of fatty acids, which can be released in use by cells when needed for energy production.
Dana Frost 16:19
You're going to see as this episode goes on the importance of cholesterol where metabolism and energy so what we need just to fire and function in the world. Phospholipids also have an important role of emulsification in the digestive system. phospho lipids help emulsify fats, they break them down into smaller droplets that can be more easily digested and absorbed in the intestines. Overall, phospholipids play essential roles in maintaining the structure and function of cells, as well as facilitating communication and metabolism throughout the body. Really important role here.
Dana Frost 17:03
Okay, so the liver, let's talk about the liver. The liver makes cholesterol and the LDL, so we have LDL and HDL. LDL, is the transport that moves cholesterol and these other passengers from the liver and delivers it to tissues. It's the building blocks. It's delivering cholesterol and triglycerides and these building blocks. So LDL is a delivering molecule of energy if there's an overabundance in the liver, if there's more than what is needed for energy, those lipid particles recirculate. If there's not a parking lot in the liver, then it goes back into the bloodstream through LDL. And those particles recirculate and they get they can, if we don't need them for energy, they go back into the bloodstream and they get stored they can get stored in the arterial wall causing plaque and a narrowing of the artery wall. So let me just stay what HDL does, it moves from the tissues and the organs. And it goes back to the liver, it's taking things back to the liver, it's cleaning things up and taking them back. You can think of it as a scavenger. So LDL is picking up what isn't being used. And it's taking back to the liver, in hopes of the liver processing and taking it out of the body.
Dana Frost 18:33
So your liver, you can also think of your livery as this amazing filtration system. That is giving your body what it needs for energy. And then taking back filtering out with the body doesn't need taking out of the body. The problem is when there's an over abundance when you don't need what's being produced for energy because you're not utilizing it and it's just got nowhere to go. So where does it go? It gets stuck in your arterial walls causing plaque and gathers along the walls of the arteries. So in general, what we hear is HDL is good LDL is bad, and that's because you can see LDL, HDL cleans things out, and LDL it's actually delivering so it's actually not bad. It's very nuanced. But if there's too much of it, it means you're not using everything that you're consuming. And so there's too much in your system, but so LDL really isn't bad. That's not really the whole truth. Also, we say like that percentage the ratio of HDL to LDL, we say we want HDL to be higher, and LDL to be lower. And that's partially true. I mean, it is actually that is true, but this relationship with LDL, and your health is super nuanced because if you have a depleted LDL cholesterol, you are more susceptible to infections.
Dana Frost 19:57
There is evidence to suggest that very low levels Have LDL cholesterol, particularly in individuals with a genetic condition can cause extremely low cholesterol levels which are associated with susceptibility to certain infection. So cholesterol does play a role in your immune system, high levels of LDL, have been shown to resist infection. So there's other research that shows that high levels are protective against infection. So you can see how it's super nuanced. LDL cholesterol can actually bind and neutralize bacterial toxins, which can be really helpful. highest levels of LDL have been shown to have longevity benefits. Again, it's all just super nuanced. So Hideyo isn't only bad, it's not you can't just say it's just bad. There's a lot of variables before you can say that it's beneficial or depleting. And if your allopathic Doctor diagnosis, you have high cholesterol, the first line of defense from their perspective is going to be to prescribe a statin. And I want you to first look at these other elements that we are talking about today.
Dana Frost 21:14
Something that's really interesting, and I think important to note is that since Statins have come on the market, the threshold for prescribing statins has lowered, lowered, lowered, lowered so I don't remember the exact numbers, but let's just say if cholesterol was four to 500, when statins came on the market, and that was the threshold, well, now it's like mid to hundreds is the threshold. So why is that? I can tell you one of the things that is a result. This is why statins and we'll talk about this later are the most commonly prescribed medication, most commonly prescribed medication. So the efficacy Yes, statins will lower cholesterol, but it's a little more nuanced and there are some complications. Before we get into statins.
Dana Frost 22:06
Let's talk about triglycerides, because triglycerides are an indication of poor metabolism of fats and carbs, high triglycerides. My situation I have high triglycerides, even though my diet doesn't contain any of the offenders, except when I dine out and I don't have control of like the seed oils that I'm exposed to. And stress can have a role to play in triglyceride Triglycerides are elevated, but I don't have I don't believe I have enough stress to really make an impact on those triglycerides. So this is where you really have to dial in to your unique bio individual situation. So I do have a genetic factor that is highly influential, where cholesterol is concerned and it has popped up into evaluations I've done over the past couple of years.
Dana Frost 22:58
And I want to pause here. For those of you who are interested in diving into your heart health and your genetic factors. As a lay person, there are three resources that I will share with you. Two I have had on the podcast one is the DNA co I had Kashif Khan as a guest, I'll put a link to that episode, I had true diagnostics. As a guest, I'll put a link to that episode, those two labs, they give you an interesting like with DNA CO, you're gonna get your genetic cardiac markers that determine your cardiac risk. So it's really interesting and they give you they basically say, based on your genetic risk, these are the things that you should be doing or you can do to impact how those genes express themselves.
Dana Frost 23:48
That's really helpful information if you have a risk of cardiac disease and to diagnostics they're looking at biological age. And also they give you really informed me a good information in terms of what's happening with these different markers are looking at in terms of your biological age, and what are the things that you can do to improve. Some people say oh, that's just fluffy lab work, but no, it actually tracking and dialing into exactly what's happening in your health really helps you make decisions about the next 10 to 20 years of your life.
Dana Frost 24:27
The other lab is called VIOME personalized supplements. I'll put a link to that in the show notes. I did this lab marker back in May. I found it super fascinating the information I got back. I really found it interesting. I tried the personalized supplements for six months and decided they weren't for me. I felt like I know how to dial in to my supplements and for the expense. I just knew that I could create my supplement regimen a lot cheaper. I However, I think their information The labs are really interesting. They are looking at four labs that you can do from the comfort of your home. urine, saliva, poop, and blood. So for markers, you get a lot of information from the VIOME labs. Just really interesting information. And then when you have, you know, for me over the past three years, I had those three different markers ways of looking at what's happening internally. And I could I see what showed in the genetics, how it played out in the labs from biome and my labs from true diagnostics, and you see how the things that you do lifestyle wise can really make an impact on how your genes get expressed.
Dana Frost 25:47
If you're working with a medical doctor. To understand your specific heart disease risk, ask them to run the Cleveland heart lab report. This profile allows you to see all the passengers and their Particle Size oxidation, the lipid profile including APO B, and APO A. If you're at risk for heart disease, you want to know more than just HDL and LDL, you really want to know exactly what is being carried. And if there's oxidation or junk on the walls, and you'll find that out with the Cleveland heart lab report. It's so so important.
Dana Frost 26:27
We're going to talk about APO B and APO a little bit later. So some important points about triglycerides. Again, because triglycerides, we need triglycerides. It's an important part of what's happening internally in energy metabolism. So, triglycerides serve as a storage form of energy in the body. When you consume more calories in your body needs. The excess calories are converted into triglycerides, and stored in fat cells for later use. So you can see why it's really important not to consume more than what you need for energy.
Dana Frost 27:03
The dietary sources of triglycerides are found in many foods, especially those high in fats and carbohydrates. Many common dietary sources of triglycerides are oils, butters, margarines, fatty meats, full fat dairy products, fried foods and sugary snacks and beverages. So you can see how the standard American diet with Elevate triglycerides. In my case, what happened this year as I dialed into it is I started eating a high fat diet. And I realized in my genetic profile, I wasn't keto. So let me be clear, I wasn't having a keto diet, but I was eating a lot more fats for brain health. And what I realized when I looked at my genetics, I don't really metabolize fats that well, so I was overdoing it on the healthy fats. And so that can also elevate triglycerides, the health implications of triglycerides, they increased the risk of cardiovascular disease. So it's really important high triglycerides are associated with obesity, insulin resistance, diabetes, and metabolic chaos. lifestyle factors have a big impact on your influence on your triglyceride levels, including, as we mentioned, consumption of high sugar and high fat foods, physical activity levels, alcohol consumption, smoking medications, I've seen this with clients.
Dana Frost 28:30
Remember, triglycerides go through the liver and your liver also has to break down and process pharmaceutical medications. If you are on a lot of pharmaceuticals, your liver is taxed if your liver is taxed with pharmaceuticals and in addition, more standard American diet foods than what your body can process or if you don't have a good metabolic response. This is going to elevate your triglycerides and increase your risk of cardiovascular disease. In summary, triglycerides play a vital role in energy metabolism, but elevated levels in the blood can increase the risk of heart disease.
Dana Frost 29:14
So we can't talk about triglycerides without mentioning seed oils. They have a direct impact on triglycerides, process soils oxidize in the bloodstream. It's like putting fuel to the fire in the arteries. If you have plaque in your arteries and you're eating a lot of seed oils, you are just putting fuel to the fire in your arteries. seed oils. Let's just talk about the fact that they were only introduced in the early to mid 20th century along with the modern industrialized food system seed oils. They're not a part of our ancestral food chain. They're highly processed, our bodies have had to adapt to digest the seed oils. The purpose of seed oils was to extend shelf life And over the years as a population, we've been exposed to an overabundance of the seed oils in the form of omega six.
Dana Frost 30:07
And another factor in commercial seed oils is the pesticide exposure and the food value compromise resulting from the processing. Pesticides are used on seed crops. And so our exposure for consuming a lot of seed oils, we have a higher exposure to pesticides. Now, if you want to dial in to seed oils, I would encourage you to go back and listen to the podcast with Udo Erasmus. Decades ago, he did a ton of research he's is known as the resource for seed oils and our body and nutrition and how we metabolize it and the best old fats and oils for health and optimized ratios. He's figured out the best ratio based on where we are. In modern times I will put the link in the show notes to that episode. If we look at unhealthy seed oils, typically referring to seed oils that are high in Omega six fatty acids and low in omega three acids. And these oils are often refined, bleached and deodorized. And they are stripped of their natural nutrients and antioxidants.
Dana Frost 31:16
So if we think about, you know, let's just think about sunflowers. Well, if we sunflowers, there's so much nutrition in sunflower seeds. And if you're having the oil, sunflower oil, it's high in Omega six fatty acids. It is commonly used in cooking, frying and baking, but it's been stripped because of the refining process. It's been stripped of its health benefits, foreign oil, soybean oil, cottonseed oil, safflower oil, the worst offender in my opinion is canola oil we've been told oh it's you know, it's healthy for you. But actually, it is highly processed and it is you know promoted for its low saturated fat content but it's just because of the processing there is no nutrition value, the body cannot process it digested. These oils just are not optimal choices for health.
Dana Frost 32:10
You can choose healthier alternatives that have high omega three such as olive oil, olive oil actually will help you clear your the plaque on your arterial walls, avocado oil and coconut oil. These oils are better for you their heart healthy, or think about healthy food sources of fats like eating the nuts, eating the seeds, eating fatty fish, those are the ways the food sources that you want to get your omega threes.
Dana Frost 32:40
Okay, let's talk a little bit about to well, we're really going to just primarily talk about one AP OB But if you haven't already heard about APO B, this is a component in it's one of the passengers in LDL and you if you haven't heard about it yet you are going to really be hearing about it. It's already on a lot of the podcasts people are talking about it. People who are zeroing into heart health and plus Ra they're talking about a POB. It's really important to know if you have high LDL what your composition of APO B is it is a protein that plays a crucial role in lipid metabolism and cardiovascular health. As I said it's one of the primary protein components of LDL. It is primarily synthesized in the liver and the intestine. It serves as a structural protein for lipoproteins it helps to stabilize and transport cholesterol and other fats, that if there are higher levels of APO B in your LDL, that means those particles are circulating in the bloodstream. This leads to the accumulation of cholesterol on the walls of the artery inflammation and development of plaque. It's in your LDL you have high levels of APO B, it's the concentration of that is a marker for cardiovascular risk.
Dana Frost 34:10
And when we're looking at high APO B levels, the drug that I mentioned earlier, that's going to be prescribed to lower that are statins. And statins They do this by blocking an enzyme in the liver Coenzyme Q 10. You may recognize that as a popular supplement Coenzyme Q 10 is involved in the production of cholesterol so statins block, the production of Coenzyme Q 10, which is actually an antioxidant it's super protective by reducing the amount of cholesterol produced by the liver. Statins help lower LDL cholesterol and to a lesser extent the lower triglycerides and then hopefully modestly, they'll increase the HDL now coma enzyme Putin is a compound that plays a crucial role in energy production within the cells. And it also, as I mentioned, is an antioxidant.
Dana Frost 35:08
So that same pathway, the statins target to lower cholesterol production, inhibits the production of Coenzyme Q 10. Okay, this is really important to note, reduced levels of Coenzyme Q 10. lead to the following symptoms, muscle weakness, fatigue, muscle pain. Other side effects of statins include liver damage digestive issues, if you remember I mentioned earlier that phospho lipids are something that is carried and the cholesterol and what do they do that breaks down that helps with breaking down fats. And so it makes sense that if you're a lowering, you are going to have issues you're going to have some digestive issues, increased blood sugar levels, and that's the first thing that I want a client to do when we're talking about cardio risk.
Dana Frost 36:03
One of the things is look at, again, how efficient is your body at when you take a nutrient N for energy, you're how efficient is your body at getting that fuel, putting it into the cells and then clearing out what you don't use and taking it out of the body. When you're on a statin you have an increased risk of blood sugar levels. This is not good. You have an increased risk for memory and cognitive impairment and increased risk of diabetes. I wanted to mention Yeah, for anyone who, you know, looks closely at cognition and longevity, you would be well aware that high blood sugar levels also impair memory and cognition. And so you see this with statins.
Dana Frost 36:53
You see, again, you see this connection, increased blood sugar levels and impaired memory and cognition, also an increased risk of diabetes with statins. Really important to understand heart health and insulin sensitivity. HDL is a proxy for insulin sensitivity. So when insulin is released to clean up the glucose from the bloodstream, and we know what does HDL do, HDL is one of the scavengers and it's also this cleaning out of the things that aren't needed and taking it back to the liver for the liberal liver to process and take out of the body. What we see is people with high HDL they generally have healthy insulin sensitivity, low HDL, those are people with poor insulin sensitivity, maybe pre diabetic or diabetic.
Dana Frost 37:45
Now, I don't know if I really want to share this. I think I will, because those of you who might be interested in taking a deeper dive, I read a book a more recently published book called Understanding the heart by Dr. Steven Hussey and really recommend this book, he highlighted that isn't it interesting that the APO B particles, they're known to create our thorough sclerosis, okay, and why is it only created in the arteries and not in the veins? Why do we get this buildup in the arteries that we don't get in the veins because these passengers are being carried through the veins and the arteries? But why is it that the arteries is where we get the buildup and he talks about this high pressure in the arteries that we don't have in the veins because of the muscle tissue in the heart. So LDL and HDL moving through the veins and also the arteries, but we don't see the damage in the vein. And when we look at insulin insensitivity, we know that there's impaired wound healing, right, that's a classic result of diabetes is impaired wound healing. What he says Could it be the root cause of atherosclerosis it's a metabolic issue and not a cholesterol issue.
Dana Frost 39:06
A normal body without metabolic issues a body that's able to clear out glucose it's not needed has the ability to repair the arterial walls. So cleaning up oxidative stress, so oxidative stress, what is it, it's the build up in the arterial walls, cleaning that up and somebody without metabolic issues has is able to re clean out the arterial walls. You can kind of think of it as scabs that don't heal. So on the arterial walls, you have scabs and then that scab, you know, you're narrowing of the walls but then because you've got that scab and it's not being cleared out, you get the cholesterol is being carried through and you it keeps collecting the tissue keeps collecting it upon itself until you end up with a blockage in you which can then result in a harmful cardiac episode.
Dana Frost 39:59
This is As oxidative stress so who is the villain with oxidative stress? Is it cholesterol? Or could it be metabolic chaos? The inability to efficiently deliver glucose and fuel to the cells followed by cleaning up that trash? What causes metabolic chaos and metabolic chaos and creates more trash? Or we should could say oxidative stress? Is it really cholesterol? Or is it standard American diet? Stress whether that stress is perceived to the stories in our head, or is it physiological, not getting enough all kinds of stress not getting enough sleep a poor diet, not enough exercise, toxic buildup in the system. I don't know if you are aware that mercury toxicity causes heart disease.
Dana Frost 40:53
More often than not high cholesterol is the result of lifestyle habits. Genetics can play a role, it's really important to look at your genes and how they're expressing but treating the causes of high cholesterol, using lifestyle habits to treat high cholesterol is really important before jumping to medications, because you might not need the medication, it's really important to understand the risk of statins and if there are things that you can do to impact your cholesterol to avoid medication.
Dana Frost 41:30
o do you know the first thing that I would do for heart disease or metabolic chaos, the very first thing that I would do, I would practice daily intermittent fasting, and I would start simply, for most people, starting with 12 hours a day is a good place to start it again, I don't out there in the audience. I'm not really sure how you know what everybody's practices are. But if you've not done any daily, if you've never done intermittent fasting, or you've never even fasted, or you know you have a standard American diet, a really good place to start is a 12 hour daily fast. And that is just simply dinner, ending dinner at seven and night eating until 7am, or six to six or eight to eight.
Dana Frost 42:18
Again, depending on your own bio individuality, you may need to make that longer. But it's really important to start someplace where you can be successful. What that does, it allows the scavengers to go in and clean out the trash, so your digestive system and your nervous system, it seeks to be reset every day. And that is done while we sleep. And when we sleep. The reset is more easily done. If your digestive system is completely at rest if the nervous system is at rest. Daily, intermittent fasting is the very first thing that I would do.
Dana Frost 42:58
Okay, we've gone over a lot of information in this episode, and I want to share those three points where I would start so number one and you some of these I've already talked about well, I've already talked about all of them, but just to give them in a concise package here for you start with your diet. What are you eating? Are you eating a standard American diet? Are you eating processed foods? Are you dining out a lot is your diet high in sugar and carbs, I can tell you that my diet has no processed foods and very, very little sugar. But one thing I have done to make an impact I actually had to cut out some fruit so even if you have genetic factors for like I have diabetes and heart disease and poor metabolic health in my genetics, the potential for I will say I actually did have to dial in and eliminate high sugar fruits and so I you know, not that I never have them but more often than not, I'm eating low sugar fruits like strawberries and berries. Really mostly that I do love oranges and Kiwis when they're in season and I love mangoes that are actually very high in sugar when they're in season but it seems to be seems to be okay when but for the most part I've cut out I even had to cut those out.
Dana Frost 44:25
So some people if you're, you know, having that standard American diet it's pretty easy to make a change for others who are already on a whole foods diet. You really have to go in there and do your research to figure out how you can improve that diet. There's a lot of heart healthy foods you can eat so I'm not even mentioning those you could Google heart healthy foods. There are so many hard healthy foods but I'll tell you like oats for one that's a hard healthy food. I do not that's a harm that I my body has a hard time you Using that carb, I just don't use the carbs from oats I get tired after I have oats. So even though it's a hard healthy food, it's not hard healthy for me. So it's really important for you to figure that out for me carbs that are my body uses really well, beans, soy legumes, so I can have lagoons I am energized, I clear that carb out of my system.
Dana Frost 45:25
So let me move into the second one metabolism and the third is stress. Okay, so food, and then metabolism on your metabolism. One way that you can learn more about how you are using the fuel your fats, and your carbs, or your sugars, how you're using them and how quickly you're clearing them is to use a glucometer. And for some using a continuous glucometer would be really helpful. I know I did that for about a year, it really helped me to figure out what I just said that Oh, I actually just have a hard time clearing the oats. That must be why I'm tired every time I eat oats, I could see that clearing like goons, I was able to to utilize those efficiently. So your fasting glucose tells you what is that when you wake up. And you after you fasted if there's glucose circulating for my clients, I actually walk them through how to do it what the levels are, I'm not going to do that in a podcast episode. But what I can tell you when we look at number three stress, stress has a direct impact on your glucose levels. And you can have a completely buttoned up diet. But if your stress levels are high, you can wake up with very high glucose levels. Just another like super bio individual thing to look at and how that impacts heart health.
Dana Frost 46:53
When you think about metabolism, you want to make sure that you have the electrolytes to charge your cells so that your cells are able to use what you're fueling it. So you want to be dialed in to your electrolytes. I think one of the key things it's I always start whether it's hormone health, you can see just as I was talking that cholesterol is a precursor for the production of hormones. Anyone who is having menopausal symptoms, the first thing that I look at is your glucose levels. And then you know your metabolism if you have fat.
Dana Frost 47:30
We know now after this episodes that the fats are just building upon themselves and your hormones excess hormones are also they can become a hormone production mechanism and your body your fat cells, we want to look at metabolism. And when before we as a main point before you go to medications, to see how efficiently you're using what you're taking in and how quickly you're clearing it out. You would do that. So you want to test your fasting glucose and then 40 minutes after you eat, you want to test again to see how quickly are you able to remove the glucose that slept in your system after eating carbohydrates. So fasting and then 40 minutes each time after you eat, you want to test again. And the easiest, you can do that with a glucometer it's a little bit easier if you use a continual glucometer.
Dana Frost 48:26
And then the third thing is stress level unconscious or conscious as I said, you could wake up and and have unconscious stress that your system is trying to metabolize while you sleep, because when you sleep, your defenses are down. And so things can come to the surface. And your body can be in trying to metabolize unconscious stress while you're sleeping. And so your heart is so smart. It actually knows all of the things that are unconscious to you. And you know your heart rate variability, that interconnectedness of the sympathetic and parasympathetic sympathetic mode that gets expressed in the heart rate variability. It's connected through your nervous system through your vagus nerve, and your heart is all knowing.
Dana Frost 49:15
And so what I am excited to talk about in the next episode is Heart Math, and the intersection of Heart Rate Variability with the nervous system and the intelligence of the heart through the lens of Heart Math. That will be my next episode on heart health. And I'm really excited to talk about that. As I mentioned, I have a client who was able to lower blood pressure with Heart Math, there's just so much to learn when it comes to Heart Math, and that we can tapping into these very, very simple, research based HeartMath breathing techniques that we can harmonize our Mind Body Soul system, so you can look forward to that I want to thank everyone for joining me this week. I want to particularly thank Coco, frosty seven for leaving a review you all know I'm trying to get to 100 reviews and she left a message trailblazer in wellness, always ahead of the curve when it comes to wellness and thought provoking wisdom and guidance. Keep it up. Thank
Dana Frost 50:20
you Coco, frosty too. I really appreciate that review and if you are enjoying these podcasts, please consider leaving a review. If you haven't, hit the subscribe button. Download and share this episode with any of your friends who need to learn a little bit more about heart health. There will be loads of resources in the show notes. Please feel free to reach out with any questions and as always, I am streaming love from my heart to yours. Bye everybody.