It's been a week

And not much has changed. No zombie invasion pending, and sadly, no change in weight according to the morning weigh in. I've been sticking with my plan. Last Friday I went for a walk at lunch. I went for a walk with A last weekend. All this week I've walked 40 minutes or more on my lunch and gone for a half jog/half walk after work, lasting anywhere from 45 minutes to an hour. A couple of times followed by yet another walk with L when she gets home from work. I have noticed my endurance is getting better. I can run for longer periods of time and spend less time walking on my after work jog/walks. I love getting out of the office and it's been a really nice week so I've been enjoying some sunshine while I can. I feel productive, doing something for my health every day. I even downloaded an app to help me track my calorie intake and exercise. I take the stairs whenever possible (because when the zombie apocalypse happens, elevators won't be working) and have continued taking my vitamins daily. I drink a ton of water and pack my workout bag at night so it's ready to go in the morning without having to think about it.
According to my tracker app, I'm eating just the right amount of calories and burning far more than I need to in order to reach the goal I have. Yet no physical changes are apparent. I have been allowing myself a daily dose of chocolate and this week my indulgence has been chocolate cake from Costco (brought into the office for a coworkers birthday and left here to taunt me). It's the stuff my chocolate coated dreams are made of and according to my tracker app, is actually fine calorie-wise for my "diet". But, after getting on the scale and seeing no change this morning, I'm thinking it's time to change tactics.
I'll be going from a small daily chocolate allowance to a small weekly chocolate allowance. I want to go to bed earlier so that I can get up earlier and get to the gym before work, for a swim or a stair climber session. I'm going to try to jog the trail by my house on the weekends at least once and get as much activity as I can in each day. I'm going to watch my food even more diligently even though I feel like I've actually been doing really well there.
It's discouraging not to see any changes but it's only been a week, and I'm certainly not giving up. I might not even really need to make many changes to see results, but I don't know if I can wait it out any longer before taking some kind of action. It makes me feel silly that something so small can affect my mood so greatly, but sometimes that's the case. And this is one of those times. Yesterday the world seemed so bright and full of hope. Today, even though it's sunny, I'm feeling gloomy and sad. It's still better than a few weeks ago when I was losing my grip on life all together.
I know I'm not the first person to feel this way and it might not be the last time I encounter a mental roadblock like this. I've dieted before and have been successful at losing weight. I know I can do it again. Maybe other things in my life are affecting my mood more and I'm assuming it's this instead. I've been dealing with feelings of loneliness, inadequacy and a general feeling of being lost in life. When I look at the facts, it's obvious that I'm doing fine. I have a house of my own to live in. I have a car to get me to and from the places I need to be. I have a full time job with a great company. I have amazing friends in my life that encourage me and love me just as I am while still pushing me to be my best self. So why all the negativity in my mind?
Sometimes emotions blind us from the facts. All I know for sure is I'm not stopping.
I walked today at lunch and tried for another after work jog/walk. For some reason, today, I wasn't able to jog. Not that I was physically incapable. I managed a short burst of running but when I couldn't make it as far as I hoped, I broke down. I felt like a failure for not being able to jog long distances (to me a long distance would be 10 minutes of jogging without stopping). I felt like I was letting myself down. I was angry. Angry that I let myself get so out of shape in the first place. Angry that I wasn't being more diligent in my efforts to get back into shape. Angry at all the people running by me like it was the easiest thing in the world. Angry at the people that seemed to have no care in the world (though I know we all have worries and doubts and moments in our lives where we feel less than).
I kept walking though. As fast as I could manage. I'm hoping tomorrow seems a little brighter.