well, what's important and what everyone who needs to lose alot should strive for is to avoid the "skinny fat" look. basically becoming a smaller version of your current shape.

unfortunately, when many people embark on a weight loss journey they lose fat but a good amount of lean mass "muscle" as well. to combat this, it's important to incorporate a good strength training regiment into your workouts. make this your priority and cardio should come second. this will build muscle and make the "skinny fat" look much less apparent and eventual you will become toned and able to maintain your new physique much more easily.

for us men, yes this is a little easier we have it engrained in the social conciouss that weight lifting is a manly thing to do...

Unfortunately, mainstream media has convinced women strength training is not necessary and or prefer to do cardio like "walking". light cardio has it's plus, but what's really needed is to fix people's metabolism and more muscle mass will do this.

me myself, I learned the hard-way and wished I had started to strength train from the very beginning, but now I realize my mistake and train hard, for least the past year. so everything is working out.