Trying to try and hoping to hope.

I've gained 40 pounds in the last year, and I know exactly how. I moved from one place to another and began eating more after the move. Initially, it was celebratory eating, and this is how I justified it. I was happy to have good ol' American food back at my fingertips, and let's just say I took advantage of it with a vengeance. Celebratory eating became recreational eating, which became depressed eating, which became more deeply depressed eating because all this eating had made me, well, fat. Despite constant awareness and self-loathing at how much newfound flab was on my body and eye-popping (button-popping) evidence that I couldn't fit into 80% of my clothes, my denial about what I look like has been impressively persistent. And still, I ate. I've seen about 5 pictures of myself in as many months. Every one I've seen has been a shock, bordering on disbelief. Who is the fat girl and why is she wearing my clothes? My face doesn't really look like that, right? Right? More seriously, it's shaming and it's disappointing, especially when I think I look cute when, really, I look...big. The discrepancy between the "me" in my head and the "me" in the picture is a sucker punch to the gut, and I do have a gut. In my mind's eye, I'm still slim. I've apparently chosen to cling to this image in order to justify destructive eating behaviors and shut out reality. I feel helpless. And I feel hopeless. This is not my first rodeo. My weight has always been up and down, but now I've smashed through what I thought was my weight ceiling. I came within a pound of reaching my goal weight year before last. I am now up 40 pounds from that, which is more than I've ever weighed in my life. I'm ashamed of how I look to the point of being a bit agoraphobic. I don't want to see anyone or meet anyone like this, which I know is terrible. Am I doomed? Do I suck it up and buy fat clothes so I can stop wearing the same five outfits that still fit? Genetically, if you take a visual survey of my family, I'm not destined to be skinny. Is my burgeoning butt a rising tide I can't win against? Is it even possible to get rid of all this glorious cellulite? If I lose weight now, will I have excess skin? Am I just scared? Yeah, I'm scared, but I'm not sure if I'm scared enough. What exactly is it going to take? I am hoping that peer support will be the catalyst to get motivated and make it stick this time. For life. So, help?