VERY inspirational. Thank you for sharing! You're looking great!!!

I noticed there was a point that your LDL skyrocketed. You and your doctor were concerned and you immediately made a plan to get it down without taking medication. I'm currently reading "Eat Fat, Get Thin" by Dr. Mark Hyman. I'm learning a lot about fat, healthy fat and unhealthy fat, cholesterol and much more! Dr. Hyman says that eating a LC diet will raise your LDL and thereby raise your total cholesterol. However, there's no reason to be concerned about this. There are two types of LDL. There's a small, dense, heavy kind, and a big, light, fluffy kind. The small, dense, heavy kind are the harmful, dangerous kind. It turns out your liver makes this kind of LDL when you eat sugar, carbs and processed food. The big, light, fluffy kind come from eating healthy fat. They are harmless. Your total LDL will be higher when you have more of the big, light, fluffy kind because anything big, light and fluffy takes up more space than something small, dense and hard. Think of the space a pound of golf balls take up. Then think of the space a pound of beach balls takes up. The beach balls are higher in number and take up more space than the golf balls, but they weigh the same.

To test for LDL particle size, you should ask your doctor for an NMR lipid profile. This test determines the particle size and number of LDL, HDL, and triglycerides. You should have fewer
than 1,000 total LDL particles and fewer than 500 small LDL particles.

I don't know if all labs will provide this test, but Dr. Hyman says you can get it through Labcorp.

Dr. Hyman provides a great downloadable pdf entitled How To Work With Your Doctor To Get What You Need. Just search the title on the internet and you'll find it.

Ken, I know you've got this! You have it all under control. I thought this a good place to mention the LDL thing for anyone else that finds this thread and has issues with high LDL. NEVER, EVER get on statins to lower your cholesterol. Another thing Dr. Hyman says is that there is no medical evidence to show that taking statin drugs reduces the risk of heart attacks. It's true they lower cholesterol, but there is also no evidence to show that high cholesterol leads to a greater risk of heart attack.

Again, thank you for posting this. I'm going to come back to reread this whenever I'm having a tough day. My story is almost identical to yours. Getting on low carb, falling off, giving up and gaining all the weight I lost back plus more, trying again, and again. It's all too familiar. Your 2-year milestone post will help me through the tough days. I'm ready to be at that place where it's easy and I don't feel tempted. Temptations have eased, but there are days they come back pretty strong. I will remember that I can't cheat, not ever!