The

Undeniable

Ruth

®

…and the Ruth shall set you free!

  • The Smoothie Diet – Your Questions Answered

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    Ruth Carter

    The 30-day smoothie diet is over, and I’ve mostly maintained the weight I lost so far. When I first went back on real food, my body seemed to scream “FOOD!” and wanted to eat everything in sight, even when I wasn’t hungry. I think that impulse is starting to settle down. I wanted to take this post to address the questions you’ve had for me about the diet.

    Evo & Me at our Final Weigh-In
    Evo & Me at our Final Weigh-In

    Would you ever do the diet again?
    Probably not. I’m glad I did the diet and I’d consider doing it again for 1-2 weeks or do 1-2 smoothies a day plus a regular meal if I needed to lose weight. Doing this diet for 30 days was hard towards the end. The novelty of the diet also made it easier to stick with it. As Dr. Terry Simpson said, people generally don’t like this diet, just the results.

    What smoothies you recommend and what smoothies you don’t recommend?
    I loved my breakfast smoothie (almond milk, nonfat vanilla Greek yogurt, coffee, and sugar-free chocolate pudding) and smoothies that combined almond milk, nonfat vanilla Greek yogurt, mango, and either raspberries or pineapple. Those were my favorites.

    The only smoothie I didn’t care for was the peanut butter smoothie, but I’m not a big peanut butter fan.

    What was your mindset going into the diet? Do you have any recommendations for others on how to stick to a diet like this for 30 days?
    In my mind, not sticking to the diet was not an option. I was going to finish it without cheating no matter what. Having my friend Evo Terra doing a crazy diet at the same time helped. We could compare stories and commiserate about missing real food.

    How did you deal with the ebb and flow of cravings?
    I just accepted that cravings were part of the deal. I’ve done raw diets before so I’ve had experience craving things that weren’t on my diet. You just ride them out like a wave. Posting my cravings on my Google+ profile was somewhat validating.

    How much pre-planning time did the diet take?
    Not that much. I went to my neighborhood grocery stores and figured out who had the best deals on my primary ingredients and made sure the fridge and freezer were always well stocked. At the beginning of each day, I jotted down a few notes about the smoothies I wanted to do that day to make sure my expected calorie count was between 1000 and 1250 calories.

    How much clean up did you have to do every day?
    I just had to wash my blender(s), cup(s), measuring cup, cutting board, knife, spoon, and spatula.

    When you were out with friends what it harder? Any will power strategies? 
    I didn’t do meals out during the smoothie diet. If I had a reception or networking event, I just drank water or club soda. The only really hard part was when my parents stayed with me for a long weekend and had friends over for dinner. I sat with them at the table and watched them eat real food while I had my smoothie, but even then it was mostly a non-issue.

    Did you have more trips to the “powder room” on this diet? How was your poo?
    I didn’t need extra trips to the restroom after I lost the initial water weight and I could definitely tell that I was on a very low fat diet.

    What was the total volume of smoothies you consumed?
    I drank 2404 ounces of smoothies on the diet, or just under 19 gallons. It would have almost filled a big party tub.

    Did you win?
    Dr. Terry will declare who won after he looks as Evo and my labs. Evo lost 14 pounds and 3.3% body fat on the diet. I lost 8.5 pounds and 4.3% body fat.

    Dr. Terry’s fancy scale will tell you what your basal metabolic rate – the minimum calories your body needs to maintain itself if you did nothing but wake up and breathe. At the beginning of the diet my BMR was 1331 calories. At the end my BMR was 1294. I asked Terry if all I had to do to maintain my weight loss was reduce my pre-diet caloric intake by 37 calories (which I can easily do by adjusting the cream and sugar in my coffee). He said, “Yes!” It’s that easy. I guess little changes do make a big difference in the big picture.

  • The Smoothie Diet Recap

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    Ruth Carter

    I’ve been on a smoothie diet for the entire month of April. It’s been really convenient not to have to worry about what I’m going to eat this month and what I need to pick up at the store.

    Photos taken on 3-31-2013, weight = 121.5
    Photos taken on 3-31-2013, weight = 121.5

    This post is coming out on April 30th, but I’m writing this on April 26th. So far, I’ve lost between 9 and 10 pounds, and according to my last weigh-in, I’ve lost 2.5% body fat and my BMI is down to 19.7. One thing I’ve learned on this diet that’s really interesting is the fact that my bathroom scale says I’m 1-2 pounds heavier than the official scale at Dr. Terry Simpson’s office.

    My smoothies all consist of almond milk and nonfat vanilla Greek yogurt. In the morning I add coffee that’s been frozen into ice cubes and sugar-free pudding and/or unsweetened cocoa powder. For the rest of my meals, I add frozen fruit and maybe some spinach. I learned the hard way that I tend to have more energy when my smoothies have banana and spinach in them. The spinach tends to turn my smoothies kinda gray or green depending on what other fruit is in it. If I get too hungry or tired, I get to have black coffee or a sugar-free gelatin cup.

    Photo taken on 4-28-2013, weight ~ 113.5lbs
    Photo taken on 4-28-2013, weight ~ 113.5lbs

    I’ve been keeping track of my calories and my average intake is 1077.40 calories per day. I try to stretch my smoothie calories out by keeping my smoothies in the freezer and every 15-30 minutes I go to the freezer and eat the newly frozen portion. That can make a smoothie last for 2-4 hours. That’s definitely helped me stave off hunger, which was my biggest fear about doing this diet.

    Of course I’ve been having weird craving, especially as the month’s been going on. Lately I’ve craved tortilla chips, a gyro with tzatziki, red velvet cheesecake, a toasted bagel with butter, glazed doughnuts, and pasta with cream sauce and bacon. As of this writing, I have no idea what my first real food is going to be. I have a feeling I should go easy on the fat and sugar at first, even though part of me would love to start my return to real food with dessert or pizza.

    It’s been really easy to set up both my blenders with ingredients and let them defrost in the fridge at the beginning of the day and then blend them up when I get hungry.

    Here’s my favorite breakfast smoothie that I’ll probably make on a regular basis once the diet is over:

    • 1 cup Almond Breeze original almond milk
    • 5oz Lucerne nonfat vanilla Greek yogurt
    • 3oz sugar-free chocolate pudding cup
    • 1 cup of coffee, frozen into ice cubes

    Put all the ingredients in the blender. Let it stand for ~15 minutes to let the ice cubes melt a little. Then blend until the ice cubes are broken down and the ingredients are blended.

    I hope I keep off some of the weight I’ve lost, but given how low my calorie counts have been, I know I can’t/won’t keep it all off.

    If you want to see how my dieting counterpart, Evo Terra, has been doing on his beer and eggs diet, check out The Beer Diet page.

  • Thirty Days of Smoothies

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    Ruth Carter

    My friend Evo Terra has successfully done a month-long beer-and-sausage diet. Oh yes, he lost weight and got healthier eating sausage (and whatever came with it) and drinking beer. (I know – it doesn’t seem logical, but it’s true.) He recently announced that for the month of April he would be doing a beer-and-eggs diet.

    Evo & Ruth
    Evo & Ruth

    Whenever Evo does a crazy diet, he is supervised by bariatric surgeon, Terry Simpson, who is an expert on weight loss. I asked Terry if he could design me a diet around desserts. He said, “Of course.” I was so excited by the idea of eating ice cream and pie for a month. Then he came back and said he could a month of smoothies. That’s not exactly milkshakes, but I was already committed to the diet idea. So Evo and I are going head-to-head for 30 days to see who gets healthier (as determined by Terry).

    So for this entire month, I will be drinking my calories. My smoothies will have a base of almond milk and Greek yogurt, and I can add virtually any food I want to it. I’ll probably start my day with a mocha smoothie and have fruit-and-spinach smoothies midday in the midday and evening. My expected total calories for each day will probably be between 1,000 and 1,250. I’ve already declared I get one ice cream smoothie for PMS purposes. I also get to have water, carbonated water, and black coffee.

    For anyone who is freaking out because I’m already small, calm down. According to the fancy scale at Dr. Terry’s office, I weigh 121.5 and my BMI is 20.9 (my bathroom scale said I was 123.8 that day). A healthy BMI is between 18.5 and 24. I’d have to drop below 108 pounds to be considered underweight. I’d be surprised if I drop below 112 on the fancy scale (114 on mine).

    Photos taken on 3-31-2013, weight = 121.5
    Photos taken on 3-31-2013, weight = 121.5

    Why am I doing this? I like challenges. It’s the same reason I ran half marathons and trained to climb the seven mountains in Phoenix in one day. And I want to beat Evo.

    I will be documenting my daily intake on my Google+ page. Feel free to add me to your circles if you want to keep up with the daily update on what I’m drinking, how I’m feeling, and what I weigh.

    I’m looking forward to having a month where I don’t have to think about what I’m eating or what to get at the grocery store. And I won’t really have to do dishes except for my blender, measuring cups, cutting board, knife, and cup.

    I think this will be fun once I settle into the new routine. I have a feeling I’ll be sipping on something most of the day rather than drinking large quantities at three separate times, but we’ll see how it goes.

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