The main drivers of gut health change are shifts in stomach acid, gut immunity and gastrointestinal flora—the complex ecosystem of bacteria in your digestive system.
When gut health is good, he says, you’re less likely to experience damaging inflammation and lapses in immunity. Histamine intolerance is becoming increasingly identified as an underlying cause of numerous strange, allergy-like symptoms, that often appear without any history of such issues. And, as histamine intolerance symptoms can be body-wide, it can become pretty difficult to pinpoint this rare, multi-faceted disorder.
The digestive system is made up of the gastrointestinal tract—also called the GI tract or digestive tract—and the liver, pancreas, and gallbladder. The GI tract is a series of hollow organs joined in a long, twisting tube from the mouth to the anus. The hollow organs that make up the GI tract are the mouth, esophagus, stomach, small intestine, large intestine, and anus. The liver, pancreas, and gallbladder are the solid organs of the digestive system.
Histamine is best known as a compound which is released in response to allergic reactions .
The release of histamine occurs as part of a normal biological mechanism. So, when your body is functioning properly, histamine is produced and degraded in tolerable amounts, thus preventing you from experiencing histamine intolerance symptoms.
Your body just doesn’t seem to be coping with the amount of this compound, and it’s leaving you with a bunch of crazy symptoms like headaches, body pains, hives, itchy eyes, stuffy nose... the list goes on.
Histamine intolerance symptoms:
Gut & Digestive Symptoms
Irritable Bowel Syndrome (especially IBS-D)
Bloating
Diarrhoea
Excessive flatulence
Constipation (less common than diarrhea)
Stomach aches or cramps (including severe menstrual cramps)
Nausea
Vomiting
Acid reflux / Heartburn / Indigestion
General digestive symptoms
Skin symptoms
Rashes
Urticaria / Hives
Psoriasis
Eczema
Acne or pimples
Rosacea or redness
Pruritis / Itchiness (also ocular pruritus or itchy eyes)
Inflammation of the skin
Respiratory symptoms
Congestion
Asthma
Runny nose
Sneezing
Chronic cough
Rhinitis
Difficulty breathing
Cardiac symptoms
Arrhythmia
Fast beating
Fluttering
Tachycardia
Circulatory symptoms
Circulatory collapse
Hypotension
Hypertension
Constant shivers or chills
Dizziness
Psychological symptoms
Anxiety
Stress
Depression
Mood swings or imbalances
Irritability
Inattentiveness
Lack of concentration
Additional symptoms
Headaches / migraines
Fibromyalgia
Watery eyes
Fatigue
Sleep issues
Oedema (swelling often around eyes, mouth and throat)
As you can see from this extensive list of histamine intolerance symptoms, there can be a lot of variability in the disorder, with an increasing number of symptoms continuing to be researched.
Die gesondheid van jou liggaam is jou verantwoordelikheid.- Suid Afrika
One of the best ways to identify if your symptoms are due to histamine intolerance, is to follow a simple low histamine diet, which is used to reduce internal histamine levels and alleviate symptoms.
Now, you’ve probably already read up on a few things about histamine containing foods, and you may even know a thing or two about how histamine should be broken down in your body (recognize the letters DAO or HNMT at all from your searches?)... But have you yet figured out what the cause may be?
Gut Health, Leaky Gut and Histamine Intolerance
One of the reasons your body isn’t managing well with this amine (histamine is part of a group of compounds called biogenic amines, by the way), is because there’s something not quite right going on in your digestive system.
To understand a little more about what’s going on, we need to talk a bit about the structure of the intestine…
The intestine is a long, muscular tube that acts as the barrier between the external world and your internal environment. When you consume food, the intestine is responsible for letting the good stuff (vitamins, minerals, etc.) enter the body, and keeping the bad stuff (toxins, pathogens, whole food particles) out of the body.
This ability to decide what goes into the body and what stays out is known as selective permeability. When it's functioning well, the good things get in, and the bad things stay out1,2. .
The intestinal wall is essential for maintaining the integrity of this system. The intestinal wall is made up of cells which are tightly packed together, and held together by tight junctions. When all is working well, the cells remain tightly together and only allow small nutrients in. However, if the tight junctions are not holding the cells as close together as they are supposed to, the gaps between the cells of the intestinal wall become larger, allowing larger, unwanted particles to enter the bloodstream 3,5,6,7. This is a condition known as leaky gut.
Leaky gut threatens the body in numerous ways - and that starts with inflammation. Think about it, when these new, foreign particles are entering your body - well, your body isn't going to recognize them.
As the body doesn't recognize the influx of abnormal compounds, the immune system launches an attack against these compounds and inflammation begins to spike.
Are you starting to see the connection?
That's right - histamine is one of the main compounds of the immune system - meaning that an overload of histamine is released into the body. This inflammatory overflow can cause any healthy person to experience histamine intolerance symptoms, even without any history of the disorder7. Then, add in the fact that some individuals have genetic deficiencies in histamine-degrading enzymes such as diamine oxidase (DAO) - and, well, it's a recipe for disaster!
If you want more information on this disorder, I suggest checking out my free 3-part leaky gut syndrome crash course to find out everything you need to know about leaky gut.
Gut Health and Histamine Intolerance
Mucus.
The gut contains a mucus lining along the intestinal wall in order to protect irritants from touching the cells and wall directly. This mucus lining is filled with mast cells 8. Does this name ring a bell? It should, because mast cells are the primary cells that carry histamine around and release histamine!
So, if this mucus lining is compromised or not functioning properly, foreign particles from the food you eat will continue to come into contact with your gut lining. This is irritating to your gut and, just like in the case of leaky gut, it causes an immune response.
When you continue to trigger immune responses, these mast cells within the mucosal lining release histamine and other compounds as a safety mechanism9,10. The trouble is, when it keeps happening, mast cells are continually activated releasing more and more histamine 11,12.
Add this to the leaky gut issues discussed above, and you've got a lot of excess histamine being released, a lot of inflammation damaging the body, and a lot of unwanted symptoms that you experience as histamine intolerance.
There is a way to improve the status of your leaky gut and improve your gut health… which means less inflammatory responses, and less histamine triggers. AKA - less symptoms and improving your histamine intolerance.
How to Improve Leaky Gut and Gut Health for Histamine Intolerance
Low histamine foods: One of the easiest ways to immediately make a significant impact on your body’s ability to tolerate histamine is to stop eating histamine liberating, containing, and DAO blocking foods. Once again, to be clear, that doesn't just mean high histamine foods - it means a variety of foods that can trigger the responses discussed above. I suggest downloading my Histamine Intolerance Diet, which contains a comprehensive list of which foods to eat an which to avoid.
Autoimmune foods: On the list described above, the foods that may be more inflammatory and threaten gut health are also eliminated. These are common foods like gluten, dairy, soy, and legumes. Be wary of nuts and other typically inflammatory foods for the first few weeks of the diet. Reducing them can only be beneficial, allowing your gut to get back into a state of balance.
Probiotics: CAUTION! Certain probiotics can help you to break down histamine in the gut. But before you jump up and get just any old supplement from your local health food store, The majority of probiotics contain strains which naturally produce histamine, by converting the amino acid histidine to histamine or through bacterial fermentation. It's a natural process that healthy bodies can handle, but in histamine intolerant individuals, make symptoms much, much worse! You need to ensure you're getting a probiotic that contains only low histamine strains of bacteria. .
Mast cell stabilizers: As mentioned above, mast cells carry around and release histamine. When attempting to reduce the overall histamine load in your body, a great way is by stabilizing mast cells so that they internally reduce your histamine release, therefore reducing overall histamine levels and symptoms. This mast cell stabilizer is by far the most powerful one I've worked with, and I use it with nearly all of my clients. They report eating a wider variety of foods with fewer symptoms within 1 to 2 weeks of starting this supplement.
Quanlim Life
Fix your Gut and your Digestive system and you will be a healthy person. - We created a whole program to fix you Gut- with only the best and real Health care products. We will do a Full scan on your Health System and put your a on a real program to heal you gut.
Johann Pretorius Professional Health Practitioner. Pretoria
