Green Smoothies with Aloe Juice, Weird Fruit Things and Christmas Trees

We have finally unpacked everything that we were planning on unpacking at our new place and are slowly getting acclimated. One side of the garage is packed to the ceiling with the other stuff that we aren't going to unpack, but there's plenty of space for one of the cars on the other side of the garage. That's "Little Red's" spot when we bring him down after Christmas.

I have found a new hair place, new nail place, two new vets for Phantom (one is a cancer specialist), new places to shop, etc. There's an overabundance of grocery stores and pharmacies in the area in all directions around us. Take your pick. We also found a farmer's market that is very, very close. The produce is AMAZING! My green smoothies have never tasted better.

While at the farmer's market we discovered this Aloe juice drink. It comes in different fruity flavors that are all good, but I really like the pineapple flavor the best. We have been adding this to the green smoothies. The Murph takes his produce and protein powder to work and makes his smoothie for lunch sometimes.

I really love this New Zealand whey protein powder made from grass fed cows. I feel healthier just reading the label!

We decided to try these for the first time. They are like grapefruits, only sweeter and were very good, but I have no idea what they are called. Pommelo or something... maybe.... ??

Yes, Pomelo. (I had to google it) They are the grandparents of the grapefruit. (that's what google said)

I still add cilantro and kale and a few different fruits, usually a banana and pear or strawberries. I add the cilantro because it helps remove toxins, such as mercury, from the body and I had high levels when I tested two or three years ago. I haven't retested yet to see if the mercury levels have gone down, but hopefully they have.

 It doesn't hurt continuing to eat the cilantro and I still have one silver filling left in my tooth so until I get it out, I will assume I am still getting mercury leaching out of it. I can't wait to have NO silver fillings left in my mouth. I had no idea the dangers of them when I had them put in.

Finding a local dentist is another thing on my list!

The cats have settled in somewhat. Phantom is okay wherever we are. Ed is pretty cool and laid back too.

 Cadence - not so much! He disappears up under the box springs during nap time and we don't see him for awhile. He feels safer there.

I put two Christmas trees up over Thanksgiving weekend. These are the only two trees I moved down here. All the others were given to charity. I really miss my big, gynormous tree, but it was too heavy to move and was over 10 years old anyway. Time to buy another big tree when we purchase our own house down here. After this move, I'm all for getting rid of everything rather than moving it. Packing, moving it, then unpacking it....

Next time I think I'll just get rid of everything, move with nothing and start over with all new stuff!

Yeah!

Why Green Smoothies?

I know I've done posts on this before, but I feel the need to do it again so click away now if your not interested in having more energy, glowing skin, reversing the aging process... well, you get the picture.

I started drinking green smoothies two years ago when I found out I had high levels of mercury and it was suggested that I start eating more cilantro. While I ate a small amount of cilantro in salsa and other mexican dishes, I felt I needed a way to get more of it in my system the fastest, least offensive way. About the same time the cilantro was recommended, I was reading about kale, how great it is and how everyone was putting it in their green smoothies. I decided those were the two ingredients I needed on a regular basis. I purchased a Vitamix which is GREAT! It blends everything up fast and very fine. Not like the blender I'm having to use now because the Vitamix is still in Birmingham. Temporarily!

I just can't tell you how much better I feel and how much better my skin looks since drinking these. I have one a day, 3 to 5 days a week. I add whatever fruits we have on hand, almost always a banana, cranberry juice, vanilla almond milk, protein powder, turmeric, cinnamon, flax seed (ground), sometimes walnuts, berries, pear, apple - whatever we have on hand. I usually add at least 2 or 3 fruits.

My husband thinks I over do it, but I'm always adding lots of things to it. It's a great way to get large amounts of greens and fruit, which I wouldn't do if it wasn't all blended together in smoothie form. I even added herbs last summer from our garden. Basil, mint and rosemary are particularly good. I add honey too since I like it a little more sweet and 2 handfuls of ice because it tastes much better cold. In the above smoothie, I even added a little avocado. I've added beets before, but they have a very strong taste. I felt like the cilantro and beets were battling out on my taste buds. Not good!! Healthy though!

Here's a list of most of the things I have added to my green smoothie and the health benefits of each. I always add Kale, Cilantro, Banana, Turmeric, Cinnamon, Protein Powder, Cranberry Juice and Honey. The other things are interchangeable.

Kale - Vitamin K, magnesium, iron, fiber, great detox food among other things. Read more about health benefits Here.

Cilantro - detoxing, binds with mercury and removes it from tissues, antibacterial, anti inflammatory

Banana - High in potassium, energy food

Walnuts- oleic acid, Omega 3.  Read the many health benefits Here.

Flax Seed- Omega 3's, fiber (better ground these babies good!)

Beets- Natural liver detox, cleanses the blood

Avocado - healthy fat, helps body absorb some nutrients, Vitamin E, lowers cholesterol

Cranberry Juice - good for kidney and bladder health although I use the diet version so I don't know how strong that is or if it has enough cranberry in it to do any good but it is the "water" for my smoothie so it isn't too thick.

Almond Milk - Vitamin E for skin health, Vitamin A for eye health, Vitamin D, more nutrients than regular dairy milk. I like the Vanilla unsweetened Almond Milk. Great in cereal too!

Protein Powder- amino acids for muscle repair and rebuild. Read more of the benefits Here.

Turmeric - anti-inflammatory, cancer fighting, heart health, anti-oxidant. GREAT stuff!

Cinnamon - regulates blood sugar, heart health. Read more benefits Here.

Berries - flavonoids and phytochemicals, help fight mental decline, heart health, diabetes

Pear- antioxidants, fight free radicals, heart health and makes a tasty green smoothie!

Apple-read the many benefits Here. My favorite health benefit of apples is quercetin - an antioxidant, anti inflammatory, also found to increase endurance and athletic performance. Quercetin is also  found in red wine so drink up!!

Basil- powerful antioxidant, anti-ageing benefits. Read more benefits Here.

Mint- soothes aches, pains and stomach problems, antiseptic and antibacterial, freshens breath

Rosemary- fights cancer, improves memory among many other things to many to list. Read more Here.

Honey- anti fungal, improves athletic performance, natural sweetener that makes smoothie taste great. Many more benefits Here.

Ginger Root - Soothes stomach, aids in digestion

Have I forgotten anything? What do you add to your green smoothies?

The Best Attempt Yet!

Yesterday I made an attempt to eat healthy all day, to make sure I got all the proper servings in each food group with very little sugar.  I felt great all day!  I don't know if I really physically felt better or it was more of a mental thing since I knew I was eating healthy so for sure I was feeling better.  Right?

Who knows for sure but this is what my attempt looked like:

1.  Cup of coffee in the morning first thing!

2.  Balance Bar on the way to the gym.  This is the one item that probably has too much sugar, but it does have many other things that are healthy and it gives me energy for my workout. I eat one just about every morning before I workout.

3.  Green Smoothie with protein powder, kale, cilantro, flax seed, banana, pear, almond milk, cranberry juice, spices, honey and whatever else I may want to throw in for lunch.  I think that's everything.

4.  Bowl of oatmeal with a splash of Almond milk, honey and cinnamon because I was craving it. This I considered lunch part 2 and a cup of green tea.

Image from quakeroats.com

5.  Red seedless grapes and a slice of Vermont cheddar cheese with reduced fat crackers evening snack

6.  Glass of red wine

Notice no cookies or anything bad or unhealthy in all the above items?

And then for dinner, even though it's March and he's declared it healthier eating month, the Murph has a craving for pizza so he orders one and added an order of cinnasticks just for me even though he ate half of them.

 So..

7.  Pizza and cinnasticks for dinner! And it was almost 10pm, which is kind of late for dinner.

Those two very bad things canceled out all the healthy foods I had earlier in the day. My healthy heart and arteries suddenly became very clogged and unhealthy.

 My taste buds were extremely happy though.

I can't even make it through one day with totally healthy eating.  And to be honest, the only reason I didn't have any cookies was because we were totally out of them because I ate them all earlier in the week.

Don't even ask how I did today because it was grocery shopping day and the bagels and cookies have been replenished.  I'll start over in a few days and try again when I'm out of cookies.  Hopefully the Murph won't get any pizza cravings either.  I can't turn down pizza or cinnastix.

Toxic

Cilantro

                                                 My levels                High Levels

Lead Detected 1210 ug/kg   H 1000 ug/kg ICPMS

Mercury Detected                 1263 ug/kg   H 400 ug/kg  ICPMS

You might have read my post here last week about the chelating green smoothie I'm drinking to try to flush some of the high levels of mercury out of my body.  I have been consuming large amounts of cilantro and reading anything I can find on the internet on the process of heavy metal elimination and mercury poisoning.  For a health obsessed person like me, this hasn't been fun.

Seriously, see my levels of mercury above.  Not to mention lead!  Your body is suppose to natural flush these things out so apparently my body is not doing the job or either I'm doing something that is putting large amounts of mercury in my body.  I don't eat fish so that's not where it's coming from.  I have one silver filling left, but could that produce toxic levels of mercury?  I had a mouth full of silver amalgams when I was 12 years old.  The more I read about them and mercury, the angrier I get about it.

I received the NAC from Life Extensions the other day and have started taking them.  This should also help my asthma and lung issues.  I wonder if my lung issues have any connection with the high mercury levels in my body?   I took one of these for the first time ever before bed the other night and I swear I could feel it working.  My entire body hurt.  I was afraid it was causing some kind of liver damage so I did some research and it actually saves the liver from toxins in your body.  Guess I had LOTs of toxins that night cause every time I've taken it since then it has had less of a noticeable effect.

I'm taking Chorella as well because it helps remove the mercury that the cilantro has pulled from wherever it is being stored (the brain among other places) and get it out of your body.  Apparently, if you don't flush it from your body, it will sit in the small intestines and will just get reabsorbed back into your body.

Mercury isn't the only heavy metal I have in my body.  Here's the report as well as the reccomendations on how to remove some of it.  As you can see, Cilantro was mentioned.  I'm not making this crap up.  Who knew!

Substance Lab Result Test Value High Value Test Method

Arsenic Detected 28.12 ug/kg 80 ug/kg ICPMS

Cadmium Detected 88.98 ug/kg 100 ug/kg ICPMS
Chromium Detected 376.6 ug/kg 500 ug/kg ICPMS

Lead Detected 1210 ug/kg   H 1000 ug/kg ICPMS

Mercury Detected 1263 ug/kg   H 400 ug/kg ICPMS

_________________________________________________________________________________________

Comments 

The Lead detection was slightly elevated. The Mercury detection presented at a level three (3) times higher than reference high values. Please review the Chelation Therapy comment below.

Chelation Therapy - The Reduction of Heavy Metal Levels

If one or more of your heavy metal detection levels reported above substantially exceed the stated reference ranges for the provided test sample you may wish to consider starting a chelation treatment. Chelation is designed to reduce heavy metal levels over a period of time. There are two (2) ways to approach the use of chelation. Present your test report to either an M.D. who specializes in chelation treatments or your local health food store who can offer you effective, non-prescription, products designed for this purpose. Consider a product identified as NAC (N-Acetyl Cysteine- oral) or equivalent. Follow the suggestions of the store technician who should have adequate product knowledge. Follow the product dosage directions stated on the product and/ or packaging container. Of equal importance you need to examine your daily food and drink intake to try and establish a cause for your elevated heavy metals levels. Following chelation therapy of 90-120 days or so you should have another hair strand or urine toxicology test conducted to see if the heavy metals levels are being reduced.

For your information Cilantro, the leaves of the Coriander plant, also known as Chinese parsley, have been reported as being an effective natural herb remedy in the reduction of some excessive heavy metal levels.  HYPERLINK "http://www.google.com/" Learn more. Cilantro is a very popular herbal ingredient found in Mexican cuisine, particularly in the salsa.

I came across this while doing research on mercury toxicity and the health benefits of cilantro.   We are living in such a polluted environment that anyone with any kind of compromised immune system and low glutathione levels could be accumulating this stuff faster than they are able to get rid of it.  I don't know if the Boy has high mercury levels like I do, but he won't touch cilantro or green smoothies anyway.

This guy reminds me of the guys who use to white water kayak with us.  The guys with long hair pulled back in a pony tail that we called "Dude" who found all the best spots on the river to show off their advanced kayaking maneuvers.  The guys that could do a perfect ender and then go right into a pirouette in their kayaks and we would be on the sidelines all clapping and yelling, "DUDE!  YEAH!"

Read more on mercury poisoning here.