I understand that everyone is a little different, so there is no one way that everyone can follow. However, my own experience is that counting carbs and calories has worked for me. Over the last 18 months I've come down from 105.6kg (16.5st) to 73kg (11.5st) and my HbA1c from 91 to 35 so that I no longer need medication. I followed Dr Cavan's advice to keep carbs to below 100g per day. As a male I ate 2000 cals per day for the first year and am currently consuming 2400 cals per day. I also use a fitbit exercise tracker to ensure that I take my 10000 steps per day, so that I at least have an estimate of my calorific burn.
The crucial thing is not to drastically reduce calorie intake but to aim at a deficit of 500 cals/day so that you are not starving but are slowly loosing weight, roughly about 1lb per week ! A sudden severe calorie reduction will cause your body to protect itself by cutting down on nonessentials such as heat to your peripheral body parts and the maintenance of skin and nails. A 1000 cals/day is the diet given to prisoners in a Gulag and will result in ill-health if you keep this up for a prolonged period of time. It also will preferentially cause your body to burn lean muscle and hang on to as much body fat as it can, so that you get a rebound in weight when you return to 'normal' eating.