I think I am doing something wrong...

I gained weight when I first started. I was very discouraged. People told me I was gaining muscle. WHATEVER I knew it wasn't muscle. After about a month of sticking with it, the pounds started to come off slowly and then eventually saw a bigger loss. Just stick with it and you will see results. I have to remind myself that I didn't gain weight overnight and therefore it isn't going to come off overnight either.

I gained weight at first too. That weight gain has come off (almost 10 lbs), but I am basically stuck at my original weight. However I keep losing inches! I was just reading about actually eating more calories so you don't put yourself in starvation mode, so I am trying to add 100 calories to my daily goal each week until I get up to about 1600 calories per day.

It could be a number of things.

It could be your body holding onto water. How much water do you drink on a daily basis? It could be your muscles holding in that water to help repair them.

It could also be that your not getting enough calories, I was working out almost every day and I wasn't seeing any weight loss I was actually seeing weight gain. I have since upped my calories and have started seeing those lbs I did loose start to come off quite easily actually!!

You could also be loosing inches, I know that I wasn't loosing weight but I did loose about 6 inches!

How about you just eat the 2300 cal a day you should be eating, and not worry about the exercise calories. You are active enough to be eating at TDEE, and don't have that much weight to lose. Your body is probably just pissed at you for trying to kill it. That much exercise will create the deficit on it's own, and you will get to your goal in a couple months and your hormone levels will me a lot more normal.

Maybe I dont understand TDEE but when calculating if you are trying to create a deficit with your exercise wouldn't I calculate it without adding in my activity? Which would put me at 1850 cal/day. And then exercising off calories on top of that sould be a deficit correct? Where are you getting your 2300 from?

REad this it all made sense to me and is amazing http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/975025-in-place-of-a-road-map-short-n-sweet

1. Intense exercise causes the muscles to retain water. I retain anywhere from 5-10 Lbs of water in my muscles for repair. When I take a rest week I usually go from a scale weight of 180/184 to 172/176 depending on the day, sodium intake, carb intake, etc. When you're talking 0.5 - 2 Lbs loss per week (on average, not linear) it can be very difficult to see short term as you can hold onto more water than the fat you are losing.

2. Calorie creep is easy if you aren't weighing and measuring your foods and portions. Also watch out for over estimating calorie burns on your eat back. This is one of the reasons I switched to TDEE long ago. When I was doing MFP I ate back about 70-80% or so of my exercise calories per HRM and that worked, but I got tired of my calories being all over the place. If I was using a data base or something even less reliable I only ate back about 50%.

I know it sounds counter-intuitive but, I'd cut back the exercise to 3 days per week. Also, don't "eat the calories back". Sounds like your bod is getting worried about survival instead of fitness.

Try increasing the nutrient density of the foods you consume. Meaning, avoid anything grain based. Cereal, bread, pasta and potatoes tend to be some of the biggest problems for people at a plateau as the body turns those foods into fat much more quickly than more nutrient dense foods like lean meats, high protein carbs (beans, quinoa, nonfat greek yogurt) and fresh fruits and veggies.

80% of your success with weight loss will come from what you eat. Exercise is great for feeling good and staying healthy, but in the long run it is what you eat that is going to make all the difference in the world.