Ep. 40 - Histamine in my food? Why should I care?

 

Welcome friends to Monday minutes. Got a little sinusy thing going on. So try to bear with me here. I'm going to make this one really fast since I don't feel so well. But it's one that I find really interesting. I deal with this myself and I know a lot of other people that do as well. But they don't even know it. It's known as a histamine intolerance.

You see, everybody has a different threshold of what they can handle for histamine in the body.

Some people are super sensitive. Others. I have no symptoms at all, or some have just. Some here and there, they don't really know what it is. They may say that's weird. I ate something and then I got diarrhea or I ate something. I got a rash that couldn't have been from what I ate. Well, maybe it was. You need to figure out where you are on the spectrum. It can explain so many symptoms you have after consuming certain types of foods. And you don't even know all this time in your whole life, you were sensitive to histamine of those foods.

So you might be asking what exactly is a histamine. Well, first of all, it's created by bacteria and enzymes when they convert the amino acid. Histidine. To histamine. As it pertains to food sources. Not talking about things like. Pollen or dust or dander. You know, your hay fever and that kind of thing.

That's your body's response where it creates its own histamines. I'm talking about food histamines.

They can cause all kinds of problems like in the digestive tract, everything from diarrhea. To intermittent diarrhea under normal conditions where. You're totally normal. And then you have. Your old bowel and in your normal again, that could be a histamine issue. Chronic constipation. Flatulence and feeling of fullness, which is bloating. Stomach cramps, stomach aches, nausea, vomiting. In your head or on your face? Things like headaches. They can be as bad as migraines, runny nose. Uh, eye issues. Even though you haven't been diagnosed with an allergy, you're saying, but this is not the time of year.

I would normally get allergies that would cause a runny nose or eye problems. Well, then it might be histamines. Dizziness. Um, Extreme tiredness. Just, you just literally feel like you're knocked out. You could have facial edema. Mostly appearing around your eyes and your lips for some reason, also sometimes around your, your throat, like her middle of your neck down there. You could have flushing of your face. And also at the same time, your chest.

Also shows up in skin issues like rashes and itchiness. Oh, I can tell you the itchiness so much itchiness. Like continuous nonstop. Itchiness. Like a mosquito bite that doesn't stop. Even if you itched it and you thought, oh, we'd have a relief for just a couple of minutes. Nope. It never goes away. You have to continuously put anti-itch stuff on or literally just use a knife and cut it off.

I'm kidding. Don't do that.

It's terrible when you get those. I get those. This is how I know. Could also have eczema hives, of course, cause histamine and hives. We all know that's a, probably a thing, right. Acne. Um, I get this one, which is kind of weird, which is these red. Dots on my skin. Other people get this too. It's like you took a red marker and just dotted your skin. And it stays there for a very long time and that creates a scar. It doesn't itch. Nothing, but just later it is this weird. Kind of light brownish look to it.

It never goes away.

And what's super weird about that is I'll get about both sides of the body in exactly the same spot. Select the outside of one knee. Other than exactly the same spot on the outside of the other knee, literally identical. That's how even your body is.

Your chest area, you can have asthma or even cardiac arrhythmias. Women have severely painful periods. Um, You could have chills and shivers, low blood pressure. Circulatory problems, even a collapse of your circulatory system.

You can have. Sudden onset psychological changes like aggressiveness. You know, you're super inattentive, just no concentration. It affects your sleep. See all these sleep disorders. But don't worry. There's things you could do. First thing you'd want to do is a food diary. Yeah. Do yourself a food diary. Everyone should basically know what they shouldn't should eat.

Anyway, if you're just going through life, eating everything, you never know what to avoid. Not everybody can eat everything.

Now there's no such thing as a histamine free diet.

Because everybody's tolerance is different. So there's no such thing as well. You can't have this, but then this guy. Can have it, even though he hasn't histamine intolerance, it doesn't work that way. It's what works for you? And you won't know until you start doing a food diary. Eric, that sounds like a lot of work.

It's really not. It's just.

When you have a flare up. You can go back to what you had the last couple of days, write it down.

Once you have it a few times. Now you can start eliminating those foods.

There is only one way that you can get rid of histamine in the body. There is no way to cook it away. You can't ferment it away. You can't wash it off. There's only one way.

And that is the enzyme called D a O diamine oxidase. Yes, you can buy it. Your body makes an amount everybody's different. I think that's probably where you are on the spectrum. If you're getting. Too much histamine your, your diet from your foods. And I'm going to tell you where he get those.

What foods contain high levels of histamine. And if you'll to make a little bit of Dao enzyme, well, then you're not going to be able to handle those foods.

So here's some general pointers. You want to avoid? Or reduce eating canned foods and ready-made meals. That's any meal.

You want to avoid or reduce eating ripened and fermented foods. Like older cheeses. Alcoholic drinks products that contain yeast. And weird things like. Fish substances and all that kind of stuff. Asian food has a lot of that.

Because histamine levels in food vary. So it depends on how ripe or mature or hygienic that food actually is. That makes it. Vulnerable for you.

As much as it is possible, you want to buy and eat fresh. Because now all those enzymes and bacteria don't have time to break down the amino acid. Histidine into histamine.

You don't want to allow the foods to linger outside the refrigerator, especially if it's meat.

Why meet. That's because meat is high in protein. And protein's made of amino acids. So. The bacteria love all that histidine.

You should ensure that your food preparation in your kitchen is always super clean. You don't have to be. Super crazy about it, but just keep it generally clean. Yeah.

If you don't know how to cook. Then you should learn. I've said this before. It can be fun once you learn how to do it. Right. But that way you can be in control of your food. You know how old it is, how long it's been out from the refrigerator or frozen. And therefore you can manage your amount of histamine in your food.

Now here's the foods that have the lowest amount of histamine.

Generally speaking. Fresh meat. That's cooled or frozen or like straight, fresh. It's what I do. I buy from Billy DOE. Meats. Out of Chicago.

It is.

Slaughtered and frozen within 24 to 36 hours. All super well raised for sustainable meat.

When they age meat. In all the store. That's two weeks in the fridge before they start. Separating it into all its. Pieces. To sell. All that time is for.

The bacteria to create all these histamines.

Ground beef has the highest because there's more surface area. So when they grind that meat, All that bacteria gets ground in between. And histamines go through the roof.

So a steak. Or anything that's its own without being ground. Much better.

I have a lot of personal experience. With this because I'm a carnivore.

I was aging, my meat. In the fridge. And I was getting massive breakouts once I realized what it was. Changed it up. Went fresh, no aging. All my problems went away.

Certain fresh fish or frozen fish, you'll have to find out what works for you. Chicken is good. But again, you have to find out what works for you. you don't know how old that chicken is. so if it's. Slaughtered in frozen. Or fresh right away. Do your best chance. Eggs are good. No issue with eggs. Fresh fruits except plantations.

Fresh vegetables are good. But not tomatoes, eggplant and spinach. Another reason to not consume spinach.

Spinach is the worst leafy green you can put in your body.

grains are all right.

Milk products are fine. Especially fresh. The enzymes, keep the. The histamine levels low. Milk substitutes like goat milk or sheep's milk is fine. Cream Cheese. All right. Mozzarella is all right. Butter's all right. Cooking oils or okay. Leafy herbs, like oregano and thyme and all that kind of stuff.

Most fruit juices are.

Okay. Except citrus. Herbal teas are pretty much. All right.

Except for a few of them. Like black tea.

The highest. Content in foods is alcohol. For obvious reasons it's aged.

Eggplant. Pickled or canned foods like sauerkrauts and. Anything pickled or canned. But really matured cheeses. Smoked meat products like salami, ham sausages, this kind of thing. Shellfish could be pretty high.

Beans peas and lentils. Any of the long stored nuts, like peanuts, cashews, almonds, pistachios. The one everyone's going to hate chocolate. And anything Coco based.

Any of the fermented soy products are going to be high. Rice. Vinegar. Pretty bad.

Anything pre-made and the grocery store for meals, all that frozen, garbage, all those types of things, anything that they make.

Just loaded. Salty snacks, sweets. Anything with preservatives and artificial colorings. Those all are high. In histamines. And people that have really serious histamine intolerance, they know it. They can't have a Reese's peanut butter cup. At a hall whatsoever.

I know bummer for them. Right. There are some foods that actually will release histamines. Out of other foods. So they're like antagonists.

Pretty much all citrus fruits. Cocoa chocolate walnuts, peanuts, papaya, pineapples, plums, Kiwi bananas, legumes. Tomatoes wheat germ. Most vinegars. Anything that has additives. Like Sulfites nitrates, glutamate food dyes. Wow. Think about that. You could list off so many additives. that they use in food. Then it outweighs the amount of food that's actually in the food.

And then of course. Like I said, you want the Dao enzyme?

Alcohol. Black tea. Energy drinks in Yerba mate. Tea. Actually stop your body. From producing. Your own DAO enzyme. If you take a Dao enzyme supplement, which you can.

And then you drink alcohol or drink black tea. Or do you energy drinks? Guess what you inhibit the use of the Dao. You're blocking it. The whole point.

So people say yogurt because there's a bacteria culture, but there's no real science behind that. It's one of those things. If it works for you, you're fine.

So people say things that have yeast in them. But that's debatable as well. Yeast extract. That's also debatable. But essentially.

You want to try and eat as clean as you can, as fresh as you can.

If you decide to do something like this. It's considered sort of an elimination diet. It's going to take about four weeks to finally start getting yourself clear of these things. Once you start figuring out what foods don't do well for you.

Then you should start to feel a lot better.

Then you'll start to realize where your personal threshold is. Once you add back certain foods that you want to try.

Histamine and tolerance is much more common than people know. And it's one of the ones that most people have no idea. It's what their cause is for most of their health conditions. So I encourage you to get your food diary, go and think about the food you're eating. When you notice something weird in and on your body, take a look back at your food, write it down, figure out what caused that.

If you see that more times than not. Guess what. You have a histamine intolerance.

And with that, I'm going to go rest my voice. I hope I can do Wednesday's episode.

I'm doing my best. Take care of yourself.