Wanting out of the 180s

I am in the same boat. I would like to friend you so we can share our ideas. I hope you will accept.

The food scale will be very enlightening. Once you're really eating that 1400, you should start seeing some change.

Food scales to help alot! Its a real eye opener

Do whatever works for you

I started at 189 in January, I don't have a workout regime. I had been gradually increasing walking and using it instead of other modes of transport before I started logging, then I got a Fitbit, synced up, and I find it much easier to understand in terms of calories burned compared with the TDEE method, so I am now eating more than I was with TDEE approach pre-Fitbit. I have been doing this for about 2-3 months, eating more or less all of my burned calories less the 500cal deficit, and consistently losing around 1lb a week, so eating back those calories hasn't hampered me.

I'm just saying this because everyone has different ways and sometimes you might get a lot of, "Work out 3x a week", or "Lift heavy", all of which will be beneficial and especially if you want to obtain a certain look, but any exercise will help to increase calorie burns.

I'm currently 163 and eat a very varied diet and also get plenty of chocolate and take out Knowing how much I'm burning helps to determine if I go for higher calorie options, or if I want to try and burn more. It's not just about take out of course, I like to have proper mayo, avocado, bananas, etc, I don't want to cut these kind of things from my diet just for the sake of calories so instead I just walk a lot

This also applies to how you eat. I've accepted that I work well with 2 big meals and snacks, and I like full cream milk and demerara sugar in my coffee, that's not changing, so I make it work within my calories. I never feel restricted so this will make it easier to maintain once I reach goal. Actually I like full fat most things, I was brought up on 'diet' foods and that didn't end well, whereas I find it much better to incorporate full fat foods in my diet in a sustainable way.

Good luck!

I started mid-January at 185, and am now at 158. I'm also on about 1400 cals.
My best tip is to be consistent and patient. You can have off-days where you eat more (those keep you sane and allow you to be social), but if you have more days where you stick to your goal, you'll lose weight. I tend to have lean week days, to allow me to eat more on the weekend. Also, find an exercise that you like or can learn to like.

Good luck!