I could have written your post a few weeks ago.Weight watchers is a very good program. It didn't work well for me though. I'm not sure why I couldn't make it work...it was me...not at all the program's fault.
Look at the section on this site for Ideal Protein. You can follow a similar protocol as that plan( I am not trying to push that particular diet on you) but the menu structure of that diet is really working for me.

Thanks so much for your replys im taking everything on board and feel so much better ive got weighed on my scales today and im 3lbs lighter than yesturday so i prob was holding alot of water with working out.
Just gona keep going and try and not worry i know im doing all the right things

An adult male only gains from working out about 5 lbs. of muscle per year, and a woman even less, and this is regular lifting. I don't think it's a muscle gain. IMHO, it's either water weight or she has undercounted her calories somewhere - perhaps an uncounted nibble here and nibble there, which adds up. It's soooo easy to do.

Do you have a source for that info? I've never heard anything like that before. I find it hard to believe we can only gain 5 lbs. or less of muscle a year!!!!

aww thanks

This is why i was soo disheartened as i didnt over eat i do weightwatchers and i was accurate all week even my leader went right through my tracker and says i had done everything right

But ive came to conclusion half pound is neither here or there and i went to a different meeting so was different scales so they could have been half apound out.
Im over it and concentrating on this week just continuing what im doing

This here, exactly.

When I went from nothing to "running" 5 times a week, I gained too. It's no big, youll be okay!

Muscle does not weigh more than fat. Muscle is smaller and denser than fat, but it does not weigh more than fat. A pound of fat weighs the same as a pound of muscle. This is a major dietary myth.

Weight gained within a week, or a couple weeks of starting a new exercise routine is not due from increased muscle, but from water retention of sore muscles. (Assuming food consumption has not increased). It is REALLY HARD for women to gain pounds of muscles and it takes HEAVY lifting... not Zumba, yoga, running, ellpitical, etc (all of which I love and there is nothing wrong with any of them).

Sorry. Those are just two of my big pet peeves. And I think it's really important to get the facts on both of them. Most likely you are gaining for reasons others have mentioned- because weight loss doesn't happen overnight, within a day, or sometimes within a week, and because muscles often retain water. But I wanted to counter those two statements though because I don't want you to continue gaining (perhaps if the calorie count was off, etc) and assume it was muscle. If you continue to gain (not a pound from week to week, but pounds over the course of several weeks/month) then it's something to be aware of and not write off to "gaining muscle." Also, some people gain because they eat more when they exercise, but if you are sure from WW you aren't doing that, then you're fine

You are probably doing GREAT and that 3 lb loss you just saw is one of many to come. As other said, it takes time. You may see no loss for a week, but keep at it. If you're doing everything right, you will see losses eventually.

And it's awesome that you are working out so much, just remember that weight loss is almost always from diet. So keep up the WW and good luck!! You're doing wonderfully!

aww thank you so much means alot that people take the time to give advice and reply to posts thanks for that info i feel much better

KittyKat, please don't post such misinformation as "muscle weighs more than fat". A pound is a pound. Muscle has less volume than fat pound for pound so her clothes would be looser. Women don't gain muscle easily and a week certainly wouldn't gain any.

Lucky 8, when you first start exercise, you retain water. It will take a week or two for your body to become adjusted. You are doing fine and the scale will eventually catch up to your efforts.

Muscles DOES INDEED weigh more than fat - Most people understand that when people say muscle weighs more than fat, they mean per equal volumes. Thus muscle weighs more than fat, because a cubic foot of muscle most definitely, does indeed weigh more than a cubic foot of fat.

Now, if someone says "a pound of muscle weighs more than a pound of fat," they're wrong, because, of course, a pound is a pound.

Also, while muscle does not and cannot turn into fat, some know this but still say "I want to turn this fat into muscle," and what they literally mean is "I want to lose fat and gain muscle."

It's like a roller coaster, isn't it? Try and set your sights on the long-term, though. You'll eventually see the changes if you stay the course.

Okie dokie...this could be helpful me, thanks!

I was a bodybuilder for years, and that was common knowledge. When you workout a muscle, you're actually tearing it. Then when you eat right and rest it afterward, it builds itself back up to where it was before, except that it's added just a bit more muscle tissue to itself as a result of the tearing. Kind of like scar tissue (though it's not that). As you might imagine from this process, it's going to take a long time to gain pounds of muscle. But what you do gain is quite noticable.

The reason why I "corrected' (or at least quibbled with) this claim is that 90% of the time when people say this is that it is used in this context:

Person A: "I am working out an hour a day for 6 days a week and yet I gained 3 lbs this week, what's wrong??"
Person B: "It's because muscle weighs more than fat. You are gaining muscle."
Persona A: "Oh okay, I guess it's okay then." or "Oh I guess I'm bulking up really fast. I should cut back on my exercise"

... when actually the gain is due to a) water retention and/or b) eating more due to increased exercise, whether for psychological, emotional, or physical reasons and/or c) moving less during the day because of exercise, either for psychological ("I worked out today, I don't need to take the stairs") or physical ("I am so tired from my workout.") reasons.

Muscle takes a LONG time to build. It takes a LOT of time to build 3 lbs (or even 1 lb) of muscle. Believing that weight gained is due to building muscles leads to the following misconceptions:
1. I don't need to work out as much because I build muscle quickly.
2. I should stop working out because the 3 lbs I gained is muscle and I don't want to bulk up.
3. The weigh I am gaining is good weight (muscle) so I'm not going to worry about it.

I corrected the statement "muscle weighs more than fat" because it was used in the context of "Don't worry about weight gain, it's because you are gaining muscle." I did not want the OP to
a) assume weight gain was for reasons other than water retention and stop working out/work out less (Misconception #1-2) or
b) actually be accidentally eating more than she should because the weight gain was due to inadvertent increase in calorie consumption (Misconception #3).

I almost always (unsolicited, of course) quibble with posts which claim that "Muscle weighs more than fat" for these reasons. I think it's really important not to fall into these three misconceptions. It often leads to a decrease in strength building exercises and can possibly lead to an inadvertent increase in caloric consumption per day, simply because the weight gain has been ascribed to the wrong reasons.

If this had been a post about someone who was 5'2, 145 lbs, extremely athletic (lifting heavily 3-4x/week with a trainer), but troubled because her BMI was higher than the normal range, it might be appropriate to remind her that because she is carrying more muscle per square inch on her body, and that muscle weighs more than fat, she will be heavier than someone carrying the same volume of fat, but that this does not imply she is overweight. (Sorry for the runon sentence.)

However, since in this case it implied "You are gaining weight after one week of exercise, that is because you are replacing fat with muscle, which weighs more," I felt it was in the OP's (and other readers') best interest to add further explanation to this implication.