I need advice

[FinallyThin]

Hello everyone, this is my first post on this board but I come back every once in a while to see what I can learn. I am in the US so I am doing the internet 1st Personal Diet. I am happy to say I am 5 lbs away from Dr. Cohen's low goal for myself but I have a dilemma. Let me start by saying I have not deviated once since I started the diet.

So here it is--my husband and I are going out of state to visit family on Jan. 26th for a week. Thursday of this week is my 50th birthday (I lost the weight as a birthday present to myself). My husband told me last week that a friend of mine is having a surprise birthday party for me, he thought I should know since I'm on the diet. My first plan was to cheat for the first time on my birthday since it is #50, get back on the diet until we leave, come home from vacation do the diet strictly for 2 weeks and then do refeed. My second option was to stick to the diet for my birthday (even though it may hurt my friends feelings) and do the refeed before we leave. The problem with that is I would have to start refeed (which I have already received) by Jan. 8th to have enough time since refeed is 18 days and I don't think I'll get the last 5 pounds off by the 8th. If I thought it would come off during refeed I would do it that way but I don't know. I really want to do this right and I've been soooooo good. I will eat as healthy as possible when we're on vacation but there's no way I can stick to Cohen's 100%. Any advice or opinions on my above ideas would be greatly appreciated. Thank you all for your words of wisdom!

[baloo]

Personally, I wouldn't worry about the friends feelings. If they were a true friend they would encourage you to stick on the diet which has transformed your life.

re: refeed. Timing isn't great but personally I would aim to get as much weight lost as possible before the trip. Enjoy the trip without going overboard. Come back and do 2 weeks of pure Cohens to get your body in Cohen's mode again and then attempt refeed.

[FinallyThin]

Thank you Baloo! I'm really not worried about her feelings. It may sound ungrateful but I never asked her to do this for me and we're really not close friends anyway, I just kinda thought I would cheat since it's my 50th. Finishing the diet the right way is more important to me though. Thanks again.

[Swannee]

congratulations on your achievement, you have done a great job, after reading your post I just thought I'd say, that if it was me I would go with your first plan, honestly you have done so well and you know what you have to keep doing BUT you only turn fifty once and I think that is really worth celebrating, you dont have to go overboard, just dress up and enjoy, you will be so busy getting compliments, you wont have time to think about any thing else
Ultimately you will do what feels right to you, but a small deviation wont be the end of the world, when you get home then you can complete the journey without the stress of time frames!
cheers, and happy birthday Swannee

[Faithy]

Hey finally this.. I'm with Baloo.. you can still celebrate & have an awesome time on your 50th... life isn't all about food anymore .. I was so upset when I was dieting on my 40th but after much soul searching I realised that this diet is just too important & I wont deviate for anyone, especially one day.. you can always have another celebration when you've finished if you want too.
Just enjoy the celebration with your friends, enjoying them & their friendship

Happy Birthday.

[Faithy]

That was meant to read finally thin LOL sorry.

[FinallyThin]

Thanks everyone!