Histamine Intolerance

I spent years suffering from histamine intolerance and sensitive to all foods from tomatoes to eggplant.

Like most people in this situation, my story during this time was not a happy one. It’s a story of spending years in agony, constant physical discomfort, and frequent emotional lows.

I was 22 years old and had just finished my Bachelor’s degree. I had just moved into a new place and was ready to start a new job. Things were going well, and I was keeping up with my workout routine and eating well as always. I was a normal, healthy person. Or so I thought…

I soon found myself bedridden, so chronically exhausted that I needed assistance to walk up the 3 steps to my apartment.

Things started off with a little fatigue – I wasn’t able to get through my workouts as usual. Hmmm… this was odd, I thought – but nothing more.

It was within a matter of weeks, I found the skin rashes, digestive issues, night time stuffiness, headaches and other strange symptoms to become rapidly worse.

It seemed like I was reacting to every food I ate, I even became fearful of my next meal and there was no chance I would consider eating out with friends or attending family dinners. I was confused and terrified, what the heck was going on with my body!?

I fought for my health. I fought hard. I forced my way into seeing doctors and specialists, spent hours in hospitals and clinics, even moved across the world to see specialists that I was “sure” could cure me – yet the answer always seemed to be the same: No conclusive diagnosis. There’s nothing clinically wrong. Live with it.

Unlike the millions of people before me who I now know have been fed this same story, I refused to accept it. I refused to accept that I would be exhausted, frustrated, unable to eat any of my favourite foods again without reacting, unable to live a single care-free day that wasn’t dictated by my symptoms. I had spent my entire life trying to be a healthy person – this could not be my fate.

So, after seeing 17 doctors across the globe, I decided to begin doing my own research through my Master of Science degree.

nobody was going to care about my health as much as I did, and it was my responsibilty to do everything I could do to return to health

I had just begun my graduate studies, and in combination with my background in Genetic & Molecular Biology, I had all the tools for figuring out this problem at my disposal. I realized that nobody was going to care about my health as much as I did, and it was my responsibility to do everything I could to return to health.

So I researched, I studied, and I combined all of the relevant information available. And then I began to find answers.

In one of my classes, we watched a clinical interview where a woman had been experiencing similar symptoms. She was diagnosed with histamine intolerance.

“What the heck is histamine intolerance?” I thought.

Well, her symptoms were similar to mine, and the diagnostic aspect seemed simple enough: simply follow a low histamine diet for two weeks – if symptoms improve, you likely have histamine intolerance. If not, it might be a different sensitivity.

I researched all of the foods I could and couldn’t eat, then was quickly off to the grocery store to begin my two weeks.

The result? Symptomatic improvement after two weeks.

I didn’t by any means fix myself, but the improvement gave me confidence that histamine intolerance was my issue. I finally had a basis to begin my recovery.

FYI, that’s step 1: if you haven’t already begun a low histamine diet, check out my free low histamine foods list to start the at-home diet today.

I spent nearly every waking hour researching the disorder at a scientific level. There was no way I wanted to remain afraid of food for the rest of my life, and awaiting the next high histamine exposure that would bring the symptoms right back. I wanted to fix myself.

With plenty of hours of research and wracking my brain to fit together the giant puzzle that is histamine intolerance, I finally developed a strategy I thought could work.