[edanm]

I agree with most of this and did this all myself to also lose 30 lbs over the last half year.

The only think I'd change is that starting with only 1500 calories a day might not make sense, it really depends on your starting weight / calorie consumption. Someone regularly consuming 3500 calories will have a really hard time going down to 1500, plus they'd lose way more muscle mass than they otherwise could.

I'd advise tracking calories for a week, then just eating 500 calories lower for two weeks as a start.

[yupper32]

You're right. I thought to not include the 1500, but went with averages to keep it simple.