You are doing all the healthy things right. You eat well, go to bed early, avoid caffeine, and you even eat low processed foods. And in spite of your best efforts, you are struggling with everything from brain fog, to gut problems, anxiety, and restlessness.
The human body is a complex machine, and sometimes, even when you are doing the right things, your body doesn’t always produce the response you’d imagined. What you might believe is a simple hormone imbalance due to age, could be a signal that something else is going on under the surface.
One thing that often gets missed is the body’s response to histamine. Histamine is naturally occurring in the body and is involved in immunity, digestion, and neurotransmission. When someone has a histamine intolerance, they may experience allergy-like symptoms and GI issues that impact your whole body. Let’s explore some symptoms that don’t seem to fit neatly together but could indicate an intolerance to histamine.
Gut Health Struggles and Supplements to Aid in Digestion
When the body can’t break down histamine properly, it causes gut inflammation, irritation, bloating, and nausea. These symptoms may lead someone to believe that they have an allergy or intolerance to a certain food. But after allergy tests, nothing conclusive can be found. It’s frustrating, but for some people, supplementing can give them some relief.
When the body is unable to break down histamine quickly, it leads to a buildup, which causes unpleasant symptoms. Using a DAO supplement has helped many people experience relief.
DAO, or diamine oxidase is the enzyme in the gut that breaks down histamine. While the body can make its own DAO, some genetic factors, medications, and nutrient deficiencies can make its production inefficient. For people who experience histamine responses from food, a quality supplement can provide the help they need while they look for ways to boost DAO naturally.
Headaches, Flushing, and Skin Reactions
When certain people eat histamine rich foods like aged cheese, fermented products, or even a small glass of wine, they may get headaches that are out of the ordinary, experience redness in the face, and even get hives. The high histamine is hard for them to process, so the body is looking for ways to get rid of it. This is often due to low or dysfunctional enzyme production, specifically in histamine N-methyltransferase and DAO.
Skin reactions can include hives, but also include itching, small bumps, and general discomfort. Some people describe it like their skin is crawling. For those who have ruled out allergies, but still experience these symptoms with specific foods, one of the best things to do is to stop eating those things to see if symptoms resolve. You can even talk to your health care team about histamine intolerance and what they recommend long term.
Your Hormones are Out of Balance
Some people believe that hormones suddenly go bad one day just because you are getting older. And while age does correlate to a decline in certain hormones, there are also many lifestyle factors to consider as well. With age can come higher stress, unhealthy eating habits, poor sleep hygiene, and more. Over time these little habits pile up until the body can’t take it anymore and hormone health struggles.
Estrogen and histamine in particular have a tricky relationship in aging women. As estrogen levels go up, immune cells can respond by releasing histamine. The higher levels of histamine can induce estrogen levels, and create a feedback loop. Many women feel this loop at its strongest during their menstrual cycle. As women hit perimenopause and menopause, their tolerance to histamine often shifts. What this means is that supplementation, closer examination of nutrient levels, and lifestyle habits become even more important.
B6, Copper, and Magnesium are Below Optimal Levels
When nutrients are low, or below optimal levels, it can signal histamine intolerance especially when combined with other symptoms. B6 is crucial for the body’s metabolism, immune system, and nerve function, and is also a cofactor for the DAO enzyme. Copper is also important for the creation of DAO and it’s used to make red blood cells, protect the body from cellular damage, and it helps absorb iron in the body. Magnesium is part of more than 600 biochemical reactions in the body. It also helps the body make its own SAM-e and can help the body prevent releasing too much histamine from mast cells.
When these nutrients are low, even if they are within what’s considered normal, it could indicate that the body is not processing histamine correctly. By addressing the root causes of high histamine, nourishing the body through foods and high quality supplementation, and avoiding high histamine foods, many people experience a decrease in symptoms and live a healthier and more vibrant life.
