Hi all

Hi Jim! Welcome! And congratulations on all those positive changes!

For advice and getting yourself started, I recommend reading most of the posts here: https://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/10300319/most-helpful-posts-general-health-fitness-and-diet-must-reads#latest. The must-read posts on these forums are great reads and can help you get a better sense of how to achieve your goals.

Here's some very general advice from me, as someone who just started a plan for losing weight a few weeks ago (and is 3-4 lbs down! yay!):

1. Losing weight and gaining weight are all about CICO (calories in, calories out). If you burn more calories than you eat, you will lose weight. This is why your diet is so important.
2. Use the calorie tracker. It's hard at first but it gets easier, and it's crucial to making sure you're staying in a caloric deficit.
3. Don't worry if you occasionally miss your calorie goal. It happens and won't matter in the long run.
4. Do worry if you consistently miss your calorie goal. This will matter in the long run, and the long run is what matters.
5. Losing weight is best measured in days and tracked over weeks. What I mean is that you should check your weight often (I check mine daily, first thing in the morning right after using the bathroom), but you should expect your weight to shift around from day to day. I once dropped 2 pounds overnight and then regained them the next day! Treat the daily measurements as just data and don't let yourself get too excited or disappointed by sudden drops or gains. Then, once you have about 3 weeks worth of data, check to see if the general trend is tracking downward. If it is, great! If not, then make small adjustments to your diet and see what happens.
6. Protein is awesome. It will help you stay full even while eating fewer calories, and it will help prevent your body from losing muscle.
7. Find a beginner's weight training program and do it. Weight training has been shown to be one of the most effective weight loss exercises, and it will improve your overall strength and fitness. I like this one (and the article that goes with it): https://aworkoutroutine.com/the-beginner-weight-training-workout-routine/. Stick to the plan, be consistent, and above all, lift with proper form, even if that means lifting lighter than you'd like. Injuries are the worst and make everything harder.
8. Losing weight and keeping it off means making long-term changes to your eating habits, and that's best done by making small adjustments to what you already do. Changing little things over time is easier to commit to than making massive changes all at once.
9. We typically lose weight the same way we gain it--slowly, almost imperceptibly, over a long period of time. A good, safe, sustainable weight loss goal is somewhere around .5-1% of your body weight per week on average. The average is important: some weeks will be better than others, and it's important to keep the big picture in mind.

Best of luck!