Hey all. Just throwing in my own story and status.
At my absolute highest I was 390. One day I accidentally saw a photo of myself, something I tried to avoid at all costs, and realized that even though I was both a man and pretty tall (6'4) I had hit a fatness level which made me look androgynous. Like if I just had long hair and was sitting down you'd be wondering "So is that a girl or what? Sure has the tits for it."
I decided to not only diet (this was easy at this stage, literally "Stop eating two of everything you like each meal", a habit which also applied to large pizzas and pints of ice cream) but exercise. I lived in a small city, so I decided to just walk around the block and figured out 1 block walk equaled .25 of a mile. At first just doing a half mile was an accomplishment. Then I started to get up to a mile. Eventually I dropped down to 330, and hovered there while I made other life changes (Finished my long-overdue degree, got a job, etc.) During the weight loss I tried various plans -- Atkins helped a lot -- but honestly, it really was just a matter of not eating two of everything, and being vaguely aware of caloric intake and BMR.
After a while my coworkers (all ex-athletes, like every single one in the office other than me was on some sports team in HS/college) joined a gym to work out, which I stumbled along with, I decided: okay, I'm going to lose weight too. Keto-ish stuff again, mostly counting calories, and keeping up with the daily walks which now were 2-3 miles every day. Eventually I dropped down to 270. No one noticed for a while since I never stopped wearing my 4XLT clothes until one day some wind blew the tent-like clothes against my body and people started to compliment me on my weight loss. Also I had a number of ex-fat people come up to me and ask how I did it, and they were kind of disappointed I just walked daily and stopped eating so much (they all had gastric bypass surgery. It was popular in the office.)
That was fine for a while, but at the start of this year I decided, fuck it, I want to hit 220 or maybe lower. I've bounced around between 260 and 270 before, but I finally figured that the only way I'm really going to get progress is permanent habit change. So, New Years Resolution: no more candy. No more cake crap. Not "As a reward for a good week" either. Nada. I make a small exception on like, Easter and Christmas when I'm eating with family. That slowly worked, but I'd stall. So I figured out what I was keeping around that was making me stall, and cut that out too. First it was cheese. Then, dried fruits. Then snack foods like chips or the like. And finally, no eating after 8pm, and ideally not after 5pm dinner. Result is I'm now in the 240s, and at this point, not only will I hit my goal, but I feel like my weight's completely in control -- I can be whatever size I want, though I don't think I want to be some 190 pound rail thin person for my height.
I also started lifting weights, which I thought I could never see progress with since I inevitably get tendon weirdness, but some diligence and moderation has shifted me from 'Fuck these 20s are heavy' to 'Okay I can do a sets with these 40s' with dumbbells. My diet is what I'd assume is fairly keto-healthy: my breakfasts (MWF light fasting) are eggs and some meat. My dinners at 5pm are meat and vegetables. I'm not super-strict keto -- I'll have some breaded chicken, or some spring rolls, now and then a sandwich, but the bulk of the meals are vegetables and meat, typically chicken or fish with salad greens. I also made it a point, this year, to get rid of bad psychological cravings/habits. I don't eagerly anticipate finally hitting my "goal weight" so I can reward myself with ice cream or candy. That stuff is not a 'reward'. It's not a comfort food. It's just a non-factor now.
Anyway, I'm not done yet and this process took years and had multiple phases. I have a sports watch which I try to hit 10k/steps daily activity with. I do something when I have nothing to do -- eating while having nothing to do was an issue, so now I just study nonstop if there's no work, do 3D art, study more programming, learn things, build things, etc. And I take supplements, just bland vitamin stuff. Once I hit my goal -- I think 215 to make sure 220 is not a mirage -- I'll update again.
