How many hours a week are you doing crossfit?

There are a couple of things here. You've lost a large amount of weight in the past but you got there by severely undereating. Your metabolism is probably suppressed quite a bit, so when increasing calories, you can expect and gain on the scale and for some, it takes quite awhile for the body to adjust. In your case since you underrate so long, you should probably consider a full metabolic reset - which means increasing cals all the way up to your TDEE number and eating at that level for 9-12 weeks before introducing a deficit again. This allows your metabolism to heal. Since you're really hungry, also another sign you need to increase even more.

I'm not sure how accurate that kind of fat test is. When I input your numbers into Scooby (not sure of your age), using a 15% deficit, I come up with a BMR of 1916 (which is lower than your test indicated) and TDEE of 3305 (which is higher than your test indicated) using 5-6 hour activity level. You may even be the next level up of you have more than 6 hours of crossfit and it you aren't sedentary the rest of the time. So that has you eating 2809 calories daily (or higher if you go up an activity level) for fat loss. It sounds to me like your TDEE is higher than your test indicated but it will take some experimenting for you to figure out - but I do think you should increase calories some more. There are some threads on the forums where you can read about increasing calories and resets.

http://scoobysworkshop.com/accurate-calorie-calculator/

I should also note than even with your test TDEE of 3174, when you take a 15% deficit from that, it still has you eating 2700 cals daily, so still under eating even when using the lowest TDEE possibility. Again, a full reset is probably best in your case.

OK, so I'm curious now on that hydrostatic fat test, how did they come up with your TDEE then? That's the part that seems off to me.

When you increase your calories, just go slowly. Add 100 calories a day per week - for example: eat 2200 daily for a week, the next week eat 2300 daily). If you go slowly, you'll help to minimize gains and it will give your body time to adjust as well as your brain. It is scary to increase that much, but once you get your head wrapped around the idea of it, you realize that's what your body really needs.

EM2WL recommends 9 weeks minimum for a full reset - preferably 12. You could increase slowly to your 15% deficit number and stay there for several weeks and monitor your progress. If you're still stuck, that probably indicates you need a reset. I hope this helps!

Should have dropped at least the initial water weight that always happens when going in to a diet - unless you are eating more sodium now.
Or workouts have increased in intensity (wrong time to do that, going in to a diet).

But the math, 20 lbs in 3 months, or 90 days then?
Take out probably 2 lbs water weight from glucose stores topped off.

18 x 3500 / 90 = 700 calorie surplus daily if that was indeed all fat.

Implying of course the real TDEE would be 2400-2700.

Which seems low if that workload has continued.

If crossfit was new and starting how from a vastly different lifestyle, some of that could be muscle too, for woman - 1 lb every 6-8 weeks. So say 2 lbs.
And then the increased glucose stores in there and total body from starting out and adding more - 1 lb.

15 x 3500 / 90 = 583 surplus

Depending on your accuracy of food logging - that's actually sounding more possible, meaning you actually ate more than you think.

And as to how you gain your fat - I've seen 2 studies of people that gained weight while still exercising, and the fat distribution is different than when people gained while sedentary.

So wouldn't be unlikely that it's not noticable.

My only concern is that still seems like low eating level for your BF% based BMR/RMR and level of workouts.

If that was truly excess eating to that degree - your workouts should have increased in performance an incredible amount.
Which might be hard to discern between just starting out and those improvements, and from eating in surplus.

Because it's also been shown that people can stress body enough to elevate cortisol and retain upwards of 20 lbs of water weight.

So the last equation of gaining max muscle for woman because this was new to you doesn't apply. Do anything but straight progressive lifting isn't going to cause those sorts of gains.

But it could be with more strict lifting that the calorie burn has indeed gone down, which it would.
And the retain water for repair has gone up, which it would if good lifting routines.

So good going down minor amount. If you don't see weight loss expected for that deficit in 4 weeks, then need to drop lower as your TDEE really isn't that high.

If this is almost daily - they are dividing up the workouts such that you are NOT doing lifting or anything intense on muscles just used for good lifting the prior day?

The expose I saw on the ability and ease to get certified for crossfit trainer and gym didn't inspire me to them doing those things correctly.
Things like allowing proper rest and recovery for repair.

I'm going to throw out crazy ideas based on no science or studies at all...so you are n my fl and I am so proud of you for trying em2wl!

I hope hey bales chimes back in on my ideas with science ....

So....let's start with carbs before were you doing low carb or paleo? When I initially upped cals last year I went up 6# not two because I was coming off low carb.

How has this weight come on? Was it 6# at first and .5/WK since then. If so its my understanding that 1/2 of that is muscle.

Even though you aren't getting the newbie gains with lifting could it be possible to see serious recomp if you have been restricting cals below BMR for so long and then start feeding the machine ? right, it makes sense you would see some serious recomp.

You haven't put on inches but gained 20#. That...to me....says recomp!

Are you looking to find your tdee and stop gaining? Have you tried taking your current tdee and reducing it 10% for 7 days. If you are at a deficit you should have 3# loss of water. If you don't your still above tdee, right....