I am starting for the kazillionth time & have a whole person to lose!

All you can really do is take it one day at a time. That weight won't come off in a few months and it probably won't even come off in a year. That's something you'll have to accept right now if you want this to work, because a lot of people give up when the weight doesn't fly off like they want it to.

The time's gonna pass anyway, you might as well spend it working towards what you want to be, instead of just passively sitting around miserable.

Start with small goals. You don't have to jump into a drastic 1,200 calorie a day/7 days a week exercise program. Just some movement every day and cutting your calories down to about 2,000 a day will give you significant results. Right now, you don't have to worry too much about being strict. It's once you start getting smaller that accuracy and consistency starts becoming extremely important.

It is very important you get a food scale though. Always weigh everything you eat in grams. This is about as accurate as you'll get with how many calories you'll eat.

Also, never, ever try to do something you don't plan on doing for the rest of your life. If you don't plan on eating clean forever, then don't attempt to eat clean just to lose weight. If you don't plan on giving up sugar forever, don't give up sugar just to lose weight. Doing these drastic things will only result in failure and regaining the weight. You need to learn how to moderate your life style into one that you can maintain forever. So everything you know you want to keep eating, even if it's pizza and burgers, start learning to moderate it now. Otherwise, you're just setting yourself up for disappointment because you never taught yourself how to deal with those kinds of things once the weight is off.

Just small steps at a time, alright? When you feel yourself really struggling and have those all too familiar bad days (we all get them. EVERYONE has bad days) just remind yourself that those are the moments where you need to prove to yourself that you're going to stick to this and not let anything become an excuse not to keep moving forward. Those are moments I personally look forward to because when things are easy and going right, that's not when true character and motivation is tested. It's those really bad, hard, pain in the butt moments that show what you are really made of. I mean, I've hit stall after stall after stall when it comes to my weight but I just pushed forward, and it always eventually continued going in the right direction.

It just takes a heck of a lot of patience.

So, don't focus on getting to 175. Just focus on a pound at a time, an inch at a time, one success at a time. A pound is a much larger amount of weight than people realize, so never marginalize it by saying "Oh I only lost a pound this week." A pound is a LOT. Always be proud of what you've accomplished whether it's a ten pounds, a pound or half a pound. You worked hard for that and you should always recognize that.

Best of luck to you. Just remember, take deep breaths, meet each challenge head on and be patient with yourself and this process. It'll take time. Lots of time, but it'll be worth it.

This is a good place. Stick around this time.

You've got to get your head straight before you do this. Find your reasons, know your common excuses and have answers for them at the ready. Find your motivation, plan how to handle social situations and realise there is no end date, this does not stop and you therefore need a plan and way of eating sustainable forever otherwise you're going to gain it all back again. The biggest battle is with the mind in making it a forever healthier lifestyle change.