I was over at my brother’s site last night and saw the sidebar image he had from when I bought a cow last January.

Part of the deal with buying the cow was that by not eating the red meat, I intended to lower my cholesterol. By combining the lack of red meat with my daily oatmeal, I hoped that by altering my diet, I could bring down my HDL level.

Well, that didn’t work. So my doctor put me on a statin (yay Zocor!) and told me to take it for 2 months and then get tested again. My cholesterol wasn’t totally off the charts, but it was 203 with only about 1/5 of that being good cholesterol. I took the medicine for two months, but then forgot to schedule my follow-up appointment. The doctor gave me another 2 months of medicine and I got my appointment scheduled, complete with the 12-hour fast beforehand.

I got my results back after a few days to some fascinating news: my cholesterol had dropped 60 points.

You read that right: 60 POINTS.

Apparently the statin did what not eating red meat and having oatmeal everyday could not. All 60 points that I shaved off my cholesterol were of the HDL persuasion. Awesome.