Gut Health, Leaky Gut and Histamine Intolerance

Do you have a high level of suspicion that you’re histamine intolerant?

Well, if 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... then you're probably on the right track!

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 maybe you haven't quite yet figured out what the cause may be and you're still struggling with the bothersome symptoms that just don't seem to want to quit.

What we're going to delve into right now will probably help. A lot!

Gut Health, Leaky Gut and Histamine Intolerance

Histamine is part of a group of compounds called biogenic amines. One of the reasons your body isn’t managing well with this amine 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.

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 out (1,2).

But how does selective permeability work and why is it so important?

Well, the intestinal wall itself is essential for maintaining the integrity of this system. The intestinal wall is made up of cells that are tightly packed together, and held together by tight junctions. When functioning optimally, the cells remain packed tightly together. The channels between them are structured and small, and only allow tiny particles and micronutrients in (3).

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 (4,5,6,7). This is a condition known as hyperintestinal permeability, or more commonly, leaky gut.

Leaky gut threatens the body in numerous ways - and it starts with inflammation. Think about it, when these foreign particles are entering the otherwise tightly controlled sterile environment of your body, well, your body isn't going to recognize them.

So, what's the outcome? An immune reaction!

That's right. The immune system is one of the key players in the regulation of anything that your cells might be exposed to. Think about your immune system as the security guards at the local mall. You're allowed in through the doors, but it's really the security guards that will escort you out if they don't think you should be there.

When the body doesn't recognize the influx of abnormal compounds, the immune system launches an attack against them. It's like when the security guards start to tussle with an offender, and reinforcements are brought in. The immune system picks up the foreign particles and calls in the troops of cytokines, mast cells and another support to helps to eliminate it, and this is when inflammation begins to spike.

Are you starting to see the connection? Did you notice that I threw in mast cells as part of the recruits needed to help out the immune system?

That's right - mast cells, and their release of histamine is one of the main pathways used by the immune system during its defensive processes. Every time there's a foreign substance or compound that makes it through into the inner tissues of the body, there's a high level of histamine is released by the mast cells.

If it happens consistently enough, this inflammatory overflow can cause any healthy person to experience histamine intolerance symptoms, even without any history of the disorder (7).

If you're someone who has histamine sensitivities, or you have a genetic deficiencies in the histamine-degrading enzymes such as diamine oxidase (DAO), well, I don't have to tell you why that's a recipe for disaster!

 

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How Something a Little Gross Could Help You Breakthrough Your Histamine Reactions

There's another gatekeeper I need to mention when it comes to important factors to consider in the link between gut health and histamine intolerance.

Let's talk mucus.

Gross, right? Well, what may seem like an unpleasant topic is actually essential to consider in this case! Here's why...

All along the walls of the digestive tract, pretty much from your mouth to your anus, is a mucus lining. This mucus lining is in place to protect you from irritants that enter your digestive system. The mucus essentially prevents these compounds from directly touching the cells that make up the walls of the intestines.

Without the thick mucus, every compound in anything that you eat or drink will come into contact with these cells. The trouble is that these cells are jam packed with mast cells (8).

Again, here we have mast cells come into play. And we know that they're the primary cells that carry histamine around and release histamine when triggered to do so!

So, if this mucus lining is compromised or not functioning properly, anything that enters into your digestive system, no matter how helpful a nutrient it may be will potentially stimulate and irritate these mast cells. When these cells are already vulnerable to being triggered, as is the case with heightened inflammation across the digestive system, not only will the mast cells release their histamine contents, but an immune response will be triggered at the same time.

When you continue to trigger immune responses, these mast cells continue to release histamine and other compounds as a safety mechanism (9,10). The trouble is, when it keeps happening, mast cells are continually activated, releasing more and more histamine, and your system simply becomes more and more sensitive to the triggering events (11,12), and it's more likely that you're going to develop digestive disorders as a result (13).

Add this to the leaky gut issues discussed above, and you've got a lot of excess histamine being released, a lot of continued inflammation left to damage other areas of the body, and a lot of unwanted symptoms being produces, all of which you experience as a result of histamine intolerance.

There is a way to improve the status of your leaky gut and improve your overall health. It means less inflammatory responses, and less histamine triggers. And best of all, less symptoms and overcoming your histamine intolerance.

Let's get to that!

How to Improve Leaky Gut and Gut Health for Histamine Intolerance

Below I'm going to detail to you how to make 5 changes to your diet to support your gut health and, in doing so, not only overcome histamine sensitivities, but improve your overall health while doing so.

• Go low! Low histamine foods, that is: One of the easiest ways to quickly 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 cutting high histamine foods from your diet - it means there are more than just high histamine foods to take into account, and it's important to consider the array 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 and which to avoid. Click below to download the free diet.

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• Beat inflammation by choosing the right foods: In addition to the list described above, the foods that may be more inflammatory and threaten gut health should also eliminated when you're aiming to tackle histamine intolerance. Foods that are widely known to have an impact on the immune system include some common foods like gluten, dairy, soy, and legumes. It's also best to avoid nuts and other typically inflammatory foods for the first few weeks of the diet. While nuts contain some great nutritional value, for some people they can trigger inflammation, and some are actually histamine-containing anyway. Even eliminating them for a short while may be beneficial, allowing your gut to get back into a state of balance.

• To probiotic or not to probiotic. That is the question. The answer when it comes to whether probiotics should be added to your gut-healing diet is to approach with CAUTION! Sure, certain probiotics can help to provide much needed gut support, and even 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, watch out: the majority of your day-to-day probiotics contain strains that naturally produce histamine. They do so by converting the amino acid histidine to histamine or through processes involved in bacterial fermentation. It's a natural process that healthy bodies can handle, but in histamine intolerant individuals, it can make symptoms much, much worse! While dealing with histamine intolerance, you need to ensure you're getting a probiotic that contains only low histamine strains of bacteria. I've created a list of low and high histamine probiotic strains, please reference this before starting any probiotic protocol. I also have a great low-histamine probiotic you could try! 

• Time to love L-glutamine: This amino acid has been well-studied in its role in gut health. It actually helps your own digestive system to keep those little cells lining your intestinal wall working as they should - AKA maintaining the protective nature of the gut lining. It's literally a food source for the cells, which helps them to continue to do what they do best. L-glutamine has also been shown to improve leaky gut by improving the mucosal barrier function, and research suggests it's such a significant effect that it can do so in as little as 10 days. As you can see,  L-glutamine is a great addition to your overall gut-health strategy to reduce your histamine levels and improve your gut health (14,15). 

• Mast cell stabilizers for the win! As mentioned above, mast cells are the type of cells in the body that carry around and release histamine when triggered to do so (16). When attempting to reduce the overall histamine load in your body, a great way to do that is to stabilize the mast cells. Once the mast cells are stabilized, they are less likely to burst open and release histamine, which is a great way to reduce your overall histamine levels and address those symptoms you've been getting as a result. 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.

Now that you know far more about the role your gut health has to play in your histamine troubles, you can see how important it is to focus on the gut as part of a strategy for both healing your histamine intolerance and preventing future disorders.

Just a few small steps in the direction of improved gut health can have a significant overall impact on your histamine intolerance and the nasty symptoms it has left you to deal with.

For a full overview of how to improve gut health and address other causes and contributors to histamine intolerance, check out my course How I Solved My Histamine Intolerance, which details every science-backed step I used in the journey to healing my own histamine intolerance for good!

References:

1. Lerner, A., et al. Changes in intestinal tight junction permeability associated with industrial food additives explain the rising incidence of autoimmune disease. Autoimmunity Reviews. 2015. 14(6):479-489. 
2. Zihni, C., et al. Tight junctions: from simple barriers to multifunctional molecular gates. 2016. Nature Reviews Molecular Cell Biology volume 17, pages 564–58. 
3. Aleman RS, Moncada M, Aryana KJ. Leaky Gut and the Ingredients That Help Treat It: A Review. Molecules. 2023;28(2):619. Published 2023 Jan 7. doi:10.3390/molecules28020619
4. Oshima, T., & Miwa, H. Gastrointestinal mucosal barrier function and diseases. J Gastroenterol. 2016 Aug;51(8):768-78. 
5. Turner, J.R. (2009) Intestinal mucosal barrier function in health and disease. Nat. Rev. Immunol. 9, 799–809 
6. Vanuytsel T, van Wanrooy S, Vanheel H, et al. Psychological stress and corticotropin-releasing hormone increase intestinal permeability in humans by a mast cell-dependent mechanism. Gut. 2014;63:1293–9. 
7. Gecse K, Roka R, Sera T, et al. Leaky gut in patients with diarrhea-predominant irritable bowel syndrome and inactive ulcerative colitis. Digestion. 2012;85:40–6. 
8. Olupot-Olupot, P., et al. 2013. Endotoxemia is common in children with Plasmodium falciparum malaria. BMC Infect. Dis. 13, 117. 
9. Gurish, M.F., Austen, K.F., 2012. Developmental origin and functional specialization of mast cell subsets. Immunity 37, 25–33. 
10. Abraham, S.N., St. John, A.L., 2010. Mast cell-orchestrated immunity to pathogens. Nat. Rev. Immunol. 10, 440–452. 
11. Potts, R. A., Tiffany, C. M., Pakpour, N., Lokken, K. L., Tiffany, C. R., Cheung, K., … Luckhart, S. (2016). Mast cells and histamine alter intestinal permeability during malaria parasite infection. Immunobiology, 221(3), 468–474. 
12. Chau, J.Y., et al. 2013. Malaria-associated l-Arginine deficiency induces mast cell-associated disruption to intestinal barrier defenses against non-typhoidal Salmonella bacteremia. Infect. Immun. 81, 3515–3526. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3811760/
13. Smolinska S, Winiarska E, Globinska A, Jutel M. Histamine: A Mediator of Intestinal Disorders-A Review. Metabolites. 2022;12(10):895. Published 2022 Sep 23. doi:10.3390/metabo12100895
14. D’Costa S, Ayyadurai S, Gibson AJ, et al. Mast Cell CRF2 Suppresses Mast Cell Degranulation and Limits the Severity of Anaphylaxis and Stress-Induced Intestinal Permeability. Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology. 2019;143(5):1865-1877.e4. doi:10.1016/j.jaci.2018.08.053
15. Achamrah, N., et al. Glutamine and the regulation of intestinal permeability: from bench to bedside. Current Opinion in Clinical Nutrition and Metabolic Care. 2017. 20(1):86-91. 
16. Thangam EB, Jemima EA, Singh H, et al. The Role of Histamine and Histamine Receptors in Mast Cell-Mediated Allergy and Inflammation: The Hunt for New Therapeutic Targets. Front Immunol. 2018;9:1873. Published 2018 Aug 13. doi:10.3389/fimmu.2018.01873