I was always the short fat kid all the way up to my late teens and puberty wasn't kind as she showed up way fucking late to this party (around 17).
I was 225 - 235 and went to 160-something.
At the peak of my weight loss I had an 8-pack and my moobs shaped up and turned tight, I do have minor stretch marks around my upper arms and sides of my stomach, but no excess skin unless if I really suck in my belly - that only encourages me to gain more muscle so it doesn't look saggy.
I started with the jump-rope and changing my diet completely, I even changed where I shopped for food (not necessary) but I needed to remodel a lot of the things that I was doing as they were keeping me from any real change. In my experience, you must change your surroundings to have an effective change that will last. No drugs, it was old-fashioned change of diet and cardio. I stayed away from weights due to extreme anxiety in public places, so I bought these great Bowflex dumbbells and bench on Ebay that I still use regularly.
I did try dieting pills once but they made my heart feel weird so I stopped taking them, I later found out that the first series of them contained speed (lmaooo). I stuck with chicken, fish and a ton of fruits and veggies. My bedroom was usually Adventures of the Fart Bitches vol. 3 but I didn't mind as I had no friends or anyone who would come over as I still lived with my family.
I had a lot of issues with going to the gym due to being an extremely anxious guy with no self-worth, so I started with a jump-rope at home and eventually I got really good, when I began seeing results I had more confidence and that's when I decided to go to the gym. I started with the elliptical, then stair-master and eventually the treadmill. Running was a great escape for me, but getting that runner's high took a while and it was worth the time it took to get there.
The best advice I can give to anyone is not to go at it cold-turkey. Take baby-steps, eliminate some things from your diet and work your way through that discipline instead of just doing it all in one day - the same goes with exercise, take it easy. Don't do it all at once. I did the mistake of doing this and I hit a cycle where I would burn out and I would stop as fast as I started, gain 20 pounds, sometimes even 30 and I'd go back into the fitness cycle. The best results for me was taking it slowly, that's how I kept the weight off permanently. I did all of this alone and the help of a great book (
Body Sculpting Bible for Men), and later on when I did make friends I helped them lose tons of weight including my twin brother by giving the same advice I received from this book.
I think what's important to say is that I never felt good-looking or sexy, I was a mooshy meat-ball with really huge tits. I was made fun of because of my looks in school so being attractive was something I never thought I would be. I lost the weight incredibly fast through just diet and exercise and the attention change was almost over night. My skin changed, bone structure became more visible. Men were looking at me, hitting on me and I wasn't used to the attention; all of this came in at once. The change was so drastic that it fucked me up mentally for a while, I became extremely disappointed/depressed (?) but after keeping the weight off and becoming older it was no longer an issue.
I would jump in head-first and burn myself out so I'd go through cycles of gaining and losing weight and I could never reach the stable place I wanted to be in, due to the frustration I tried binging and purging but it wasn't for me. I would some times skip meals for weeks but this also wasn't for me, hell, I found myself binging food when I would burn out and it was bad (and really expensive.
The best results came from taking it easy, being patient with the process and not spending too much time looking at myself in the mirror which was a challenge to do after noticing the very first results.
