I would like to lose 60 pounds in the next six to seven months

Hi, I'm new to this site, but I'm 21.. I'm 215 and 5'5. I work at a daycare, and soon starting my second job at homedepo... I have tried almost every diet pill there is out there, and doesn't seem to work. I ride my bike at less a hour every two days, and I walk to work. I haven't had time to go to the gym, but do have a membership. I don't drink pop and I am staying away from junk food. I am not sure why, I am not seeing any weight lose... am I just not that into it or can stress have a big roll in it..... please help..

Others will have some great advice Im sure. Check out the posts from Dan about cutting and such. Lots of great info. Im still learning myself.
 I lost 45 pounds myself in 5 months through exercise and watching my eating, but not to my 100% best.   Dont get too stuck on doing certain diets. You will need a lifestyle change in order to keep your hard work worth while. Its been A few years since I started, but now Im 70 pounds down and do not need to lose any more.

Go onto fitday.com and create you a login. Track EVERY bite of food you eat or drink. Try not to estimate, and if you eat one potato chip, log that. Take the time to weigh portions, break down nutrition lables and such. Its a lot more work than just exercising and not eating lots of junk food, but well worth it. Track the food for a week of just maintaining what you weigh, and you will find out what your maintance calories are and if you are getting enough protien, good fat and carbs.  Yes, you need fat to lose weight, but only the good fats.

My response is very simple, I know, but there is lots of info. The one thing that you need to wrap your head around is that to lose weight, you need less calories. Something I have learned in the past 6 months is that lots of junk non needed good for nothing calories can be cut by things we never thought of. When you get those cut, then you will be eating clean. Take a green salid for instance. Healthy right? Perhaps untill you put a little of the light or fat free ranch on it. Thats is how you can take a clean food and make it unclean. Get rid of any calories that do not go into rebuilding and sustaining your body. That will take care of a lot of issues. Now, I find that I  have to force myself  to eat enough clean food just to get to my maintanance calories so that I dont loose weight. There ends up being more volume to clean food than not clean foods.

Anyway, lots of luck.

^^Pretty good post up there.

Very simple answer, but the truth. Either eat less and/or exercise more. Also eating clean is nice, but if all you eat is mcdonalds and the servings are small enough, you'll still lose weight. So try to eat clean, but don't be afraid to cheat. Because after a while of eating clean and losing weight you just decide for the next to weeks to get 8 double cheeseburgers a day and gain it all back.

Goals by end of 2009:
Bench 205
Squat 255 ATG
Squat Clean 185

"There is no elevator to success, you must take the stairs."

thank you guys so much...