Newbie here :)

FutureMrsColon1

Hi everyone ! I just wanted to quickly introduce myself I am currently on a quest to lose about 60 lbs by the end of August....... it has been an uphill battle thus far unfortunately. For the past 3 weeks I have been consistently going to the gym 5x a week and I only eat fish fresh veggies and fruit but somehow I have managed to GAIN 1 pound..... frustrating as everything but I am not giving up so hoping to find some motivation and ladies to talk to here

unchatenfrance

HI and welcome!  

Remember that our bodies retain water and so your weight can fluctuate by as much as 4% of your body weight over the course of the month, so don't freak out over one pound. Instead chart your long-term progress rather than day-to-day or even week-to-week.

Are you tracking calories? What workouts are you doing? You may be over-exercising, which can cause your body to hold on to fat. If you do lots of steady-state cardio, make sure to stay in the 60-75% of max HR zone. It is also very likely that you've gained muscle from exercising, which is why the scale is showing a weight increase. Can you see or feel a difference in your body? Are your clothes fitting differently?

Also, to truly accurately chart your weight progression, make sure to weigh yourself at the same time of day. Water retention affects the scale, and I've also noticed that so does the post-workout hormonal response. I only weigh myself once a month - always right after my TOM has passed (so I'm not retaining water), in the morning the day after a non-workout day (so the lactic acid and whatnot isn't weighing down the scale, either). I've found that that gives me the most accurate (and by that I mean the lowest) scale reading. I'm sure you can tune in to your own body's peculiarities too, and find ways of getting the most consistent readings.

unchatenfrance

Also, could you provide more info on your diet? You said you only eat fish, raw vegetables and fruits. It sounds like you need more fat in your diet. Never eat fruit as a snack all on its own - you need fat to slow down the digestion and regulate blood sugar, as well as to absorb nutrients, the vast majority of which are fat-soluble (you need to consume them with fat in order for the body to absorb them). Many vegetables also are much easier on the stomach (to both digest and absorb nutrients) if they're cooked. I'm all for Paleo and not eating grains, but that is an extremely limited diet you're on, and it is possible you're undereating (in terms of nutrients, or calories, or both) and/or over-exercising.

FutureMrsColon1

Thanks for the responses guys and yes I do track my calories .. usually between 1000- 1200 per day. I dont eat meat so a sample day for me would look something like this:

Breakfast: glass of OJ , steel coat oatmeal with berries and a hard boiled egg

AM Snack: Carrots and Celery

Lunch: Cottage Cheese, Tuna with Pepper and half an Avocado

PM Snack : Fig Newtons or an Apple

Dinner: Salmon Quinoa and steamed broccoli

Usually doing about 30-45 min of cardio

Arms circut 15 reps 3x light weight

Legs Circuit Heavy weight low reps and then 10-15 min light cardio

FutureMrsColon1

oh and StageManager14 no I used to be a heavy soda drinker (partly why I got to where I am) but now I stay with about 1 glass of unsweetened juice a day and my water

unchatenfrance

I think you may not be eating enough, especially fat.  Despite the low calories, that's a very carb-heavy diet. Your breakfast, in particular, is very high in sugars. Spontaneous calorie restriction is great (such as Paleo-style Intermittent Fasting) but if you continually undereat you are applying a chronic stressor to your body and going into "starvation mode" - and your body essentially learns to run on the 1000-1200 cals, without shedding any fat. And chronic stress = weight retention/gain.

So, my suggestions are: add more fat and ditch some of the carbs (even "complex carbs" are essentially sugars); and vary your diet from day to day (both in terms of calories and choice of food). So, eat at your BMR level for a few days, then one day drop to 1000-1200 cals. That's fine. But as I said, chronic undereating will only set you back.

How many times a week are you doing cardio? If you're doing steady-state cardio, don't exceed the 75% of HR max. To really get your heart going, do HIIT (high intensity interval training, where you raise your HR to above 75% max for no longer than a minute at a time).

Also, it is very imprortant to dial into other sources of chronic stress. Are you sleeping welll? Do you bring your work home with you?