Vacation time!  I look forward to our annual family reunion every year.  Although it is great to see family ( more or less), it is also because the family reunion takes place up at my brother-in-law's cabin on the lake in beautiful Maine.  A chance to get away from it all, unplug and unwind...all with cooler more comfortable weather than the hot sticky weather in my hometown. 

So what can go wrong?  Besides the obvious family dramas?  Well, let's just say it is also an eating marathon. From the moment you get there, you are literally surrounded but all sorts of food and alcohol. You can easily put on 5 to 7 pounds during the course of a week.  And I am short so that can be catastrophic for me because it takes me forever to even lose 1 pound let alone 5 pounds. 

I tried very very hard to fight the annual vacation gain, but at the end of the day I am not without temptation.  I mean what kind of person can shun the food day in and day out. This vacation is second only in temptation to a cruise where the whole point is to eat your weight in food. 

But this year, I did achieve a small victory, I only gained 3 pounds!  No small feat for me.  I had to walk an average of 5 miles a day to achieve only a 3 pound weight gain.  Hey, it's something!!  Of course, even the walking was torcherous because of the many bug bites I sustained (it is Maine after all).  

So now back to reality, I have 3 additional pounds to lose. Was it worth the weight gain?  Well, let's see...YES!!  I mean what kind of vacation would it be if I spent the entire time stressing out about what I am eating. I mean, aren't you supposed to be decompressing and destressing? Also, if all I am thinking about is going back to my normal routine, hey why bother going on vacation at all?  Ever?  So, I figure, I need to learn to relax, enjoy life and just accept that I will have to deal with the aftermath of vacation...well, after vacation. 

Part of this weight loss journey is supposed to be about introspection. I want to live my life and enjoy living it or I am just waiting to die in which case why bother losing any weight?