Firstly 80% of your cholesterol is made by the liver, your dietary intake only contributes 20% to the total cholesterol in your body.

We actually need cholesterol to make our mother hormone pregnenolone, which can then convert into progesterone and then cortisol, estrogen and testosterone.

Cholesterol is a key factor for hormone production… but we need key nutrients to convert it into hormones, specifically zinc and essential fatty acids. If you’re deficient in zinc or essential fatty acids, then cholesterol can’t be converted into pregnenolone and that’s when it accumulates and becomes a problem for the liver to deal with.

Some great sources of zinc include: oysters, dark chocolate, chickpeas, eggs, pumpkin seeds and spinach. And for your essential fatty acids, try adding in avocados, oily fish like salmon and tuna, walnuts, seaweed, hemp seeds and kidney beans. Make sure you get those key nutrients in to support your body’s natural breakdown of cholesterol.

We also need to make sure that we optimise your liver function (this tends to be where I start when it comes to high cholesterol levels), as this is the deeper issue often in combination with the deficiencies.

It is also why I don’t recommend cutting out high cholesterol foods like butter and eggs, because they aren’t the problem and they won’t be what makes the big difference in your cholesterol balancing out and you feeling more energised.