More Pieces In The Histamine Puzzle

I have found a lot of advice about histamine issues to be much too simplistic, and when I try to eat in a low histamine way, I don't do as well, overall.  But I have still been struggling with histamine issues.  I am working with the doc to figure out various things, but in the mean time, I experiment and read, and slowly put the puzzle together.


I have said that I think the statements are probably misleading that all fermented food is a problem for people with histamine issues, before.  I have observed fermented food soothing my histamine issues in some cases, even when they seem to irritate them initially.

Really, the problem is that food is a complicated set of substances and we're looking for simplistic "avoid" and "eat" lists to function from.  But we lose a lot that is useful in that oversimplification process.  The following is one example of why it is likely that we need to be much more thoughtful about this question and not toss the baby with the bath water.  http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3398942/

 Other reasons that ferments tend to work for me probably include some of what I ferment.  Many foods function as mast cell stabilizers or in other ways that create a positive impact in terms of mast cell management.

Garlic harvest from my garden last week.

As a few examples, I uses a lot of nasturtium flowers and leaves in my diet.  Also I use water cress which is in the same plant family.  Both seem to help my issues.  I use onions and garlic in nearly everything.  I also use basil, thyme and tarragon in most things, all of which have been show to help with mast cell stabilization.

And in sweet ferments, I often add some of my garden chamomile flowers that I dry every year.  I also add ginger to most, as well as mint and nettle to some.  All of those have positive effects on mast cell problems.  I also use apples and peaches which both help with mast cell stability.

I also do a lot of things with pineapple, because of its anti-inflammatory properties.

Also, I eat a ton of dried and fresh oregano.  It contains both luteolin and quercetin, which help with mast cell stabilization.  Anything with those bioflavones are a good bet for helping with mast cell stability, really.  Other examples that make it into my ferments and diet on this subject include raw dock leaves, radish leaves, arugula, dill weed, cilantro, and fennel bulb.

Lovage, blackberries and horseradish leaves are all great sources, too, and horseradish and lovage are things I have added to my garden and eat regularly, because you can't find them in the store.  There are others, as well.

Lovage and horseradish 

But I really believe part of the success case for managing mast cell issues is relearning a lot of the lost cultural knowledge about food combinations.  I think part of the reason my ferments seem to help is that almost all of them include something on that list, or not included, but also good at mast cell stabilization.

And I have noticed that how well my liver is functioning, and whether or not my omega 3 levels are in balance also matter a great deal.  I also have much less trouble when I manage to eat liver a couple times a week.  All of those things together tend to help a bunch.  If I am having a super rough night, I will then take an extra vitamin C (not sourced from grains!), or make myself a tea from nettle, honey, mint leaves, and chamomile flowers.

So far, all of that is helping me manage the histamine reactions, and since really nailing this stuff, I have seen the weight loss really ramp up in rates.  I think it is possible that histamines were the primary problem with my utter inability to lose weight.  Now that I am getting the whole thing under control, the pounds are falling off.  As of this morning, I have lost 168 pounds since I started eating this way, and have not gone hungry once.  And that fact has also helped reduce my stress level, which probably isn't hurting either.

As you go about your quest for healing, be careful out there about oversimplifications.  And also, I have found with histamine issues that I have to try something off and on several times to get a good sense of what helps and what doesn't.  When I eliminate based on the first reaction, sometimes I find that my body had a strong response because things were so out of balance, not because of a genuine allergic reaction.  So I do better on the sum total of the data I can gather of several attempts at different times of day, and combined with different foods.  That is one reason I have kept such diet diversity, where a lot of people are down to a couple foods they feel safe eating.  This isn't a simple problem, and we have to puzzle solve in this game of 3d chess, not try to simplify the problem to tic tac toe.  Good luck out there. 

For those looking for more info on foods rich in these substances, here are a few links.  http://www.quercetin.com/overview/food-chart and http://secretsofnaturalhealing.blogspot.com/2010/12/luteolin-rich-foods-shown-to-reduce.html, and http://nutritiondata.self.com/foods-000138000000000000000-w.html, http://thescienceofeating.com/2015/04/02/foods-that-help-stop-seasonal-allergies/