Welcome to Dishing Up Nutritions, Ask a Nutritionist.

I'm Teresa Wegener, a registered and licensed dietitian with nutritional weight and wellness.

Today, we're answering a question from a listener about fat and cholesterol,

which is good, which is bad, and how it works. There is a lot of media about fat and cholesterol.

One day it's good for you, and the next day it's going to cause you to gain

weight and you are going to have heart disease because of the fat and cholesterol that we're eating.

With all the differing opinions, let's dive into the topic. So grab your headphones,

your earbuds, your AirPods, or just turn up your speakers, and sit back and we'll get started.

So let's get started with cholesterol.

Cholesterol is a fat-like, waxy substance that helps your body make cell membranes, many hormones, and vitamin D. The cholesterol is a fat-like, waxy substance that helps your body make cell membranes, many hormones, and vitamin D.

The cholesterol in your blood comes from two different places. It comes from the food

you eat and from your liver. So when you think about this, when you go to have your blood

drawn to measure your cholesterol

levels, we want you to be fasting because that gives us a better indication of the cholesterol

your liver is making.

And that is really what we're trying to get the answer to when we're having those labs drawn.

If prior to a blood draw, you ate a breakfast with a couple of eggs, which contain

372 milligrams of cholesterol, as your body is digesting those eggs and that cholesterol, it's

in your bloodstream because of that digestion.

And so that will show up on your labs and elevate your cholesterol levels.

So that's why we recommend being fasted when you go in to get that blood drawn.

This is important for you to know because current research indicates that for most people,

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