How to Increase Muscle Mass With Gout

Exercising for the purpose of building muscle is difficult in and of itself, but the process becomes more difficult when it is combined with a chronic health condition such as gout. According to information from the medical Web site Medline Plus, gout is a type of arthritis that causes pain in the joints from a buildup of uric acid. While the existence of gout will make muscle building harder, it can still be accomplished with a few basic steps.

Things You'll Need

• Notebook

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Instructions

Increasing Muscle Mass

• 1

  Train hard with resistance exercises to provide your body with the proper stimulus to increase its level of muscle mass. You should aim to train between three and four days per week, aiming to train all the major muscles of the body with compound free weight exercises like squats, dead lifts, bench pressing, dips, pull ups, rows, push ups and the like.

• 2

  Modify your workout to avoid exacerbating the symptoms of gout. When you are suffering from a major episode you might want to reschedule your lifting for another day. If the episode is less severe or localized, you should still try to get to the gym and do what you can. For example, when you are having an attack of gout in the knees, you might want to avoid heavy leg movements like squatting. Instead, you can replace these movements with machine exercises that do not place a lot of loading on the joints of the knee such as hamstring curls and leg extensions. Learning to work around the problem will go a long way towards ensuring that you build maximal muscle even while affected with gout.

• 3

  Consume a sufficient number of calories to promote muscle growth. Muscle does not just magically appear--you have to consume more calories than you are burning in order to provide your body with the building blocks from which muscle can be formed. Attempt to eat a similar number of calories per day, listing everything you eat (and your total calories consumed) in a food log. Weigh yourself weekly, aiming to gain a pound or two every week or so. If you are not gaining on schedule, increase the number of calories you are eating per day by 300 or so.

• 4

  Consume mostly fresh meats, fruits, vegetables, whole grains and natural fats to gain the most muscle, while avoiding the specific foods that can trigger gout. According to Medline Plus, these foods include liver, kidneys, sardines, beans, peas, mushrooms, gravy, spinach, yeast, cauliflower and asparagus. Eating mostly natural foods while avoiding those particular items will ensure that the bulk of your weight gain will be muscle.