SPEAKER 1: My name is Mark, I live in Georgia. And I am a teacher of 15 years, and I'm also a writer.

I've had high cholesterol basically since I was 20 years old. I've always had to deal with my weight, you know, ever since-- actually since I was in high school. I want to blame genetics, and maybe that is the case. Because everyone in my family has also had to deal with their weight and with high cholesterol. So it's not my fault, It is my fault too.

I can tell a huge difference when I make sure that I exercise and when I eat better. I can tell it in the way that I feel, the way that I perform. Before the pandemic, I had been on the Keto diet for a year and a half. And I had lost 60 pounds. But when I went in to get my cholesterol checked, my doctor was like, great on your weight loss, but your cholesterol was higher than it was. What I decided to do then was to start to eat less red meat and to eat more chicken and fish.

The biggest hurdle for me and maintaining a proper diet is the fact that I'm not just cooking for myself, but I am cooking for my mother. Parents are just as finicky as children. And where I like to eat chicken and broccoli and a salad which is what I was on for so long when I saw positive results, lots of vegetables, lean meat, you know that doesn't go over so well in the house. So I've had to compromise. And, of course, compromise more in their favor than my own.

One of the things that made me really want to better myself and to lose weight and to lower my cholesterol is seeing her. She's had difficulty walking up stairs or walking long distances. When I am 70 years old, when I'm 60 years old, I want to be able to walk up a flight of stairs. I want to be able to walk into a store and not have to sit-in a buggy and ride around.

There's a quality of life that I want to maintain as long as I can. And I realize that if I don't change something now, that's not going to happen. I have to change the way I eat. I have to start exercising more, and it's something that I have to start doing consistently. I have a feeling that if my cholesterol is up this time, my doctor is going to go from just giving a gentle warning to he might beat me up. [LAUGHS]