I did 30 lbs in about the same amount of time from July to November of last year.
The main catalyst for me was stumbling into a new meditation practice, and the main benefit of that practice is that I was as to diminish my emotional or habitual attachments to food. For example, there was a period where I constantly had thoughts that I should eat something, and I was able to counter those thoughts with a “check in” and subsequent awareness that I was not at that moment truly hungry. This could happen dozens of times between meals.
I also realized that I wasn’t going to starve, so I made a point to eat just enough to get to the next meal. I didn’t worry about getting hungry in between meals, because if I did, then I would eat just enough to get to the next meal. So no matter what the food fed body hunger and not much else.
I changed my food prep routine. Generally, I cooked everything ahead of time and kept it ready to eat or reheat in the fridge. That way, I didnt have to wait or do much work when I was ready to eat. My diet was really clean—all organic veggies, fruit, brown rice, beans, nuts, eggs, butter and milk. I tossed the veggies in oil (olive, grapeseed or macadamia nut) and roasted them in the oven, or I’d sauté or steam leafy greens. I stopped seasoning, but that was more for simplicity, so I only used butter, salt and oil. To drink, I had milk or sparkling water.
I cut out sugar and wheat, except maybe for honey if I really needed something sweet. Sugar begets sugar and it’s difficult to stop that craving. After not eating wheat for a couple of weeks, I found that wheat was causing my abdomen to swell and created GI unpleasantries that disappeared if I didn’t eat it.
I did no physical exercise during this period, yet amazingly I would regularly wake up a half pound lighter than the day before, and this seemed to happen most days of the week.
One other notable thing that happened was that my appetite changed. I no longer had a crazy crashing hunger that had to be sated immediately. Instead, I developed a mild and pleasant sense of hunger that could be sated now or even and hour from now. That was trippy. Also, I started getting full on less food. In fact, I would be stuffed at my old halfway point.
Good luck!