Histamine Well Podcast: Exploring Histamine, Methylation & Holistic Health

Understanding Histamine: How it works and what happens when it's too high

• Joanne Kennedy • Episode 1

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In the inaugural episode of the Histamine Well Podcast, Joanne, introduces the nuanced topic of histamine intolerance. Designed for both health practitioners and patients, the episode breaks down the science behind histamine, its role in the body, the widespread issue of chronic inflammation driving up histamine levels, and the symptoms it causes such as skin issues, gastrointestinal problems, anxiety, migraines, insomnia and hormonal imbalances. 

Joanne emphasizes the need for a comprehensive approach to diagnose and treat histamine intolerance through understanding its root causes rather than just following restrictive low-histamine diets. She also shares her journey into understanding histamine and offers insights into making practical and informed decisions for better health.

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Joanne Kennedy:

Welcome to the Histamine Well Podcast, designed for practitioners and patients alike. This is your trusted source for insights on histamine intolerance, methylation, gut health, women's hormones, and much more. I'm Joanne Kennedy, your host, naturopath, author, and educator. Passionate about breaking down complex science into clear, accessible knowledge. Whether you're a health professional or navigating your personal wellness journey, the Histamine Well podcast bridges the gap between cutting edge research and practical understanding to empower you with the tools to thrive. Are you struggling with histamine issues and feeling lost on where to begin? Have you spent countless years and thousands of dollars on doctor's appointments that have left you with no answers? Well, I'm here to tell you that you are not alone. This is what I see in my patients, in my clinical practice every single day. And it's globally. It's all throughout Australia, Asia, Europe, United Arab Emirates, United States, Canada. I have patients all over the world who come to me after years and years of suffering, and they have histamine intolerance. They have high histamine levels, which is a really common symptom. Why is it common? It's common because it's the effect of chronic inflammation. What we are seeing in patients globally is that they have chronic inflammation. And when it comes to these chronic health issues, there is such a gap in understanding. Especially, and I hate to say it, from your first point of contact. Usually your general practitioner who is not aware of the symptoms of histamine. You might also be seeing nutritionists, naturopaths, functional medicine doctors, and not getting any help there either. It's a really sad state of affairs. And I'm here to tell you that it needs to be corrected. And this is why I'm here. I'm really trying to get the message on histamine, histamine intolerance, and methylation issues out there because patients are just suffering so badly. And there's no reason for it because We know the causes and we know how to fix the majority of those causes. So we really do need to get the message out there that histamine is a really big deal. So, why do I know so much about histamine? Well, I tell you what, I had no idea about it when I was at college. I didn't even know about it when I first started in clinical practice. And I also know that nutritionists and naturopaths are still not learning about it at college. The girls that trained with me and then worked for me, as well as the practitioners doing my histamine and methylation training course. A lot of them want to do that course because they didn't learn about it at college or university. They have histamine issues themselves, so they know that it's a big deal. And they've all started to see patients in their clinical practice with histamine issues. So it is really widespread. Now these girls only graduated within the last couple of years. So I really don't think it's changing quickly enough. When I was studying. Well, I was a mature age student. And as you do, you really put a lot of time and effort into it. And I did a lot of extra research and webinars throughout my entire degree. And one of the courses I did was on methylation with Dr. Ben Lynch. So I learned all about MTHFR and methylation over methylating, under methylating, all the methylation pathways. And I was super interested. And at the same time that I was improving my knowledge in this area, a clinic opened in Sydney, which specializes in MTHFR and methylation. And I was fortunate enough to start working there pretty much when I first graduated. And this is where I was exposed to the whole world of histamine. I'll tell you a little story. It's somewhat embarrassing. But you know what? It was not my fault because I didn't actually know about this. I had one of my first patients. She was covered in hives. She had chronic anxiety, chronic insomnia, and she was taking methylated B vitamins. So if anyone's looked into methylation, a very simple way of looking at it, is that if someone has low histamine in their blood-- hers was like 0. 3 and is taking methyl nutrients, then it means she's breaking down her histamine too much and that she's over methylating. But what I didn't know was that her symptoms were high histamine. I mean, I knew that hives were, but I didn't know about the chronic anxiety and the chronic insomnia. And so I pulled her off those methyl Bs and she didn't get any better. So she chose another practitioner at the clinic. And rightly so, she's actually a friend of mine. And after she saw this new practitioner, that practitioner came in and said to me, Hey Jo, this is a histamine case. And I said, what do you mean? And she started rattling off all the symptoms of high histamine. And I was like, wow, I've seen so many patients like this. This is what people are presenting with. And it was with that knowledge that I started to see patients with histamine issues every single day in clinical practice. And it makes sense because people have the health issues where they're seeking support from naturopaths, and nutritionists. And especially people doing their gene reports, because they're often chronically unwell. They have things like SIBO. They have digestive enzyme insufficiency that's just gone unmanaged. They're taking proton pump inhibitors. They have large bowel dysbiosis, candida. They have hormonal imbalance. They have mould toxicity, and they have oxalate problems. These are some of the main causes of high histamine. I'm not going to chat about those too much today as my next episode will be all about the major causes of high histamine. But today I want to dive into the science of histamine. What it is. How we break it down. A lot of this information I actually got when I was writing my ebook on histamine. So obviously when you write a book, you need to do a deep dive into everything. I needed it to be well researched. My mentor at the time was a doctor. He was going to read it. So I was nervous. I needed to make sure it was right. And I was dumbfounded. The most researched molecule in medical science is histamine. Why? They're looking for the drugs to block the receptors. So they're not really looking at how to fix the problem. And it's actually diet, lifestyle, supplements, dealing with environmental triggers. This is how you treat histamine issues. So I did a deep dive and learnt so much from doing all that research, which is what I'm going to share with you today. It's complex. But I will do my best to break it down so that you can understand. So we're going to be discussing what exactly histamine is and why it's actually essential for your body. Because it is, we need it. How it's produced. How it's broken down. And then what happens when histamine levels spiral out of balance. And this causes what we call histamine intolerance. We'll also cover all the signs and symptoms. So if you're a practitioner, listen in because these signs and symptoms will help you so much with getting to understanding the root causes of illness in your patients. You'll be able to see patterns and it's an amazing tool to use to streamline your clinical practice. Your protocols. So you really learn quickly what testing you need to do and how to use dietary interventions to get people's histamines down really fast. So this will help you get amazing results with your patients really quickly. And if you are suffering yourself with chronic health issues and you've got no answers, I'd suggest grab a pen and paper. Obviously, if you're driving, you can always come back to this episode later. And you can jot down all the different signs and symptoms of high histamine, which are a lot. And I'll be talking about those in this episode. So let's begin. Histamine is a biogenic amine, and biogenic simply refers to something created by organisms like humans, animals, and plants. So humans make histamine, so do animals, so do plants. Obviously, when we're consuming animals, they can be full of histamine. And a lot of plant food is very high in histamine. Which is why people react to high histamine foods when they've got a buildup of histamine in their body. So histamine, we need it. It's a really important part of the immune system. So it actually widens capillaries that's called vasodilation. This allows your immune cells, your white blood cells to go to the site of injury and help repair. It is also involved in the constriction of bronchial smooth muscle. This is the normal part of breathing. When histamine gets high. This is why we can get wheezing, shortness of breath, and asthma attacks because of the impact on the bronchial smooth muscle. It's involved in constriction of the uterine smooth muscle, so this helps with embryo implantation and labor. Now, because it's contracting the uterine smooth muscle, definitely high histamine can lead to more severe menstrual cramps. And it's definitely not helpful for endometriosis. So endometriosis is an inflammatory condition. It's more of an immune system dysregulation than anything. And histamine is going to make that obviously worse. So I've had patients and I know ladies, if you've got endo, it's very painful. I ask my normal period pain women, what is the pain out of 10? They say five, six. And do painkillers work? Yeah, yeah. They work or they take the edge off. But with endo, I don't even bother. If the pain is 20 out of 10. It's bad. I have had some patients reduce histamine and it helps significantly with their period pain, even with endometriosis. So if you've got endo, this is something that you can look into. Another really important role of histamine is that it stimulates gastric acid secretion. So that's hydrochloric acid, and this is a really big deal clinically. So people will get reflux and heartburn. They'll go to the GP. They're sent for an endoscopy. They're told, Oh, like, not sure what's causing this heartburn reflux. We need to put you on a proton pump inhibitor, which is going to block the acid. Stop the hydrochloric acid. And the problem with this is that it actually starts to cause or make the causes of why you have high histamine in the first place worse. So histamine stimulates the H2 receptor and it increases hydrochloric acid. But when you have dysregulated acid reflux and hydrochloric acid being produced, it's not doing it when you're just eating a steak, it can do it at random times. And then these people are put on these PPIs, which is going to reduce your hydrochloric acid and therefore reduce the absorption of important nutrients like vitamin B12. As you'll learn throughout my podcast in upcoming episodes, vitamin B12 is really important for methylation. And methylation is one of the ways the body breaks down histamine. It can also cause SIBO, which is another major cause of high histamine. So clinicians listening, getting histamine down in your patients with chronic reflux and heartburn can be really, really helpful. Now, if they've got SIBO as well, you'll need to do a SIBO low histamine diet. And so often these patients come back to me within a couple of weeks and their reflux and heartburn is gone. They've stopped their medication and we're then able, if we need to supplement with hydrochloric acid to help get their levels back up. So to help them chew their steak and to get their digestion working. It's also involved in supporting the stimulation of oestrogen for ovulation. So we need that. But ladies, this as you know, can cause havoc. And if you're a woman with high oestrogen and high histamine, you'll know all about it. So it can cause massive issues with histamine symptoms at ovulation. When your oestrogen is peaking or before menstruation, when your progesterone drops. Another really interesting role that histamine plays in the body is that it acts as a neurotransmitter. A neurotransmitter is a chemical messenger that carries signals within your nervous system. And as a neurotransmitter, histamine is involved in the sleep wake cycle. So it helps you sleep, it helps you wake up. It regulates appetite. It helps promote learning and memory. It promotes the release of noradrenaline and adrenaline. These are your stress hormones. So we need these, we need to mount a healthy stress response. It helps promote the release of serotonin. So serotonin is there just to make you feel happy, calm, good. So it's like a nice day. It's a nice sunny day. I'm going to go for a walk. Everything is good. I feel happy. It's just that baseline, simple happiness. And then we've got dopamine. So histamine can stimulate the release of dopamine. And dopamine is more like when you feel motivated and empowered when you do something whereby you get a reward. That's what happens when dopamine raises. So there are many roles that histamine plays in the body. And as you'll learn, the systems that it impacts and is helpful for-- obviously when it's too high, it will cause adverse reactions in those systems. So where is histamine coming from in our body? What's coming from cells? And there are several types of cells that will make histamine. We have the white blood cells, which are your immune cells. We have mast cells. Now mast cells are complex cells. They contain many inflammatory mediators. One of them is histamine. And they're called a granulocyte. And a granulocyte means that they store histamine inside themselves. When these mast cells are stimulated by something such as a toxin or a mould mycotoxin, the antibodies that are created will stimulate the mast cells to degranulate and release histamine very, very quickly. This causes anaphylactic reactions. The interesting thing about this is that when I was trying to get my head around mast cell activation syndrome and chronic inflammatory response syndrome-- both often caused by mould, is that I realized that mast cells also do what's called differential release. Whereby they release histamine over time. Over like 72 hours when under duress from things like viruses. COVID will do it. Some mould can do it, infections, et cetera. So it's not that mast cells always cause that anaphylactic reaction. They can actually release histamine more slowly over time, which is not causing anaphylaxis, but just the histamine symptoms. We've also got basophils. They're also a granulocyte. They will release histamine under duress from infection and inflammation. And we've got other white blood cells that are going to release histamine when stimulated by inflammation. They include macrophages, the neutrophils and lymphocytes. So lymphocytes are key players in the adaptive immune response. They produce antibodies. So lots of cells in your immune system will release histamine. And rightly so, because it actually is a healthy immune response. It helps vasodilate blood vessels so that the white blood cells can go into the site of injury and do their job. Histamine is also made within keratinocytes, which are skin cells. So I know histamine causes massive skin issues. It's one of the things we see commonly in clinic. So we do have these histamine producing cells on our skin. We've also got endothelial cells. These are found in blood vessels and lymphatic vessels. They influence things like capillary permeability, which is another really important of the immune system. We've got smooth muscle cells. And I was so glad when I found this research because this is where I'm seeing so many patients have histamine coming from the smooth muscle cells. So smooth muscle cells are in the gastrointestinal tract. And so much histamine can be produced in the gut when there is gut issues. And you'll learn all about this in episode two. It's also in the smooth muscle cells of the urinary bladder. One of the symptoms of high histamine can be frequent urination. It's often the oxalates causing issues with the urinary system, which will drive up histamine. Which is often why we have these histamine symptoms, but it's actually coming from the oxalate. So once you get the oxalates down, often the histamine will calm down. Smooth muscle cells are also found in the male and female reproductive tracts, the respiratory tract, and also the skin. And we've also got neurons or nerve cells. These are cells in the brain and the spinal cord. And they will release histamine under duress from inflammation. Before we go any further, I want to speak directly to the practitioners and students listening. If you're intrigued by histamine intolerance and eager to expand your knowledge, particularly around methylation and how to apply this understanding in clinical practice, we offer the Histamine and Methylation Online Group Coaching Course. The only program of its kind. It covers everything you need to know about histamine and methylation, providing both the theory and guidance, you need to treat these issues effectively in clinical practice. To learn more and apply, visit joannekennedynaturopathy.com so histamine just doesn't float around the body with no purpose. It needs to attach to a receptor. Now when I was doing research for my book, I came across a research paper that had a diagram. So visually I find diagrams so helpful. It's how I learned the methylation pathways because it was diagrams and histamine is the same. So this is an amazing diagram that shows you all the different histamine receptors. There are four of them. And what specific systems in the body they impact. Now practitioners, you need this diagram, like you absolutely have to have this diagram. You can print it off, put it on your wall, look at it. Show your patients and say, look. Look at all of these systems in your body where you're getting symptoms. I really think this is a histamine issue and that will guide you to getting the right testing done and the right treatments that you need for these patients to uncover why they have histamine issues in the first place. So I'll put this diagram in the show notes. And the show notes will be on my website. So histamine receptors are on the cells of most organs and therefore systems in the body including the respiratory tract, the skin, cardiovascular system, the uterus, gastrointestinal tract and the central nervous system. We can simply go through and understand when histamine is high, how it's impacting these systems and what symptoms they are going to cause. On the skin-- it can cause hives, itchy skin, red skin, flushing, eczema, rosacea, acne. And I know there's not a lot of research for acne. But 100% it is a major cause of acne because we know there are histamine receptors in the sebaceous glands. So definitely causes acne. In the respiratory system-- it causes nasal congestion, runny nose, sneezing, shortness of breath, asthma. In the gastrointestinal tract-- it causes reflux or heartburn, abdominal pain, abdominal bloating, fluctuance, diarrhea, nausea, or vomiting. In the cardiovascular system-- it can cause anaphylaxis, heart palpitations, and high blood pressure. And in the central nervous system-- it can cause vertigo, headaches, migraines, insomnia, anxiety, depression, and an inability to control your body temperature. I had a patient of mine. She was one of my most extreme histamine patients I've ever seen. It was the middle of summer in Sydney, which is really hot and humid. And she was in a ski jacket, that freezing cold. She had massive issues with controlling her body temperature. It's a funny symptom. So if you do Have a patient presenting like that, then you can look at all the other histamine symptoms. So you'd be going through and asking her if she has a lot of the other histamine symptoms or even one of the histamine symptoms. Because that can often be really overlooked. So it can definitely be an issue with histamine causing these crazy dysregulated body temperature issues. So there's so much research on everything that I've just spoken to you about. Research everywhere. It's science really. But lo and behold, it doesn't surprise me. Especially with the lack of knowledge around menopause, is that there's next to no research on the way that histamine impacts oestrogen and oestrogen impacts histamine. But I'm here to tell you that it absolutely does. And women suffering with histamine and oestrogen symptoms can attest to this. There is a massive link and the symptoms are very obvious. So it's actually really great clinically to see these patterns in your women because you can really nail down quickly that it is a histamine case. So for instance, when women are getting headaches or migraines at ovulation or before menstruation. Red flag histamine. Dizziness or vertigo at menstruation. Again, red flag histamine. Nausea at ovulation or before menstruation. Red flag histamine. Why ovulation because oestrogen is peaking and oestrogen can stimulate histamine. Premenstrual irritability and or anxiety. I know that can be caused from low progesterone. But if you've got low progesterone, you'll have unopposed oestrogen. Again, this can increase histamine. Insomnia at ovulation or before menstruation. Like I know insomnia before menstruation can be low progesterone. But if they're getting it at ovulation, then that definitely can be histamine related. Histamine definitely makes premenstrual dysphoric disorder and PMS worse. And also if you've noticed a worsening of any pre existing histamine symptom at ovulation or before menstruation. That is absolutely a classic sign that it's definitely that link between histamine and oestrogen. Oestrogen driving up histamine and histamine driving up oestrogen. If you're a practitioner, I strongly advise that you use this information with all of these symptoms in your patient intake form so that you can clearly see,"wow, this looks like a histamine case." When I see patients and I look at the form and someone's got skin issues, they've got reflux, heartburn, vertigo, headaches. It's like,"wow, this is histamine." We can get to the point really quickly. And we can get to understanding what tests we need to do so that we can get to the root cause of these patients issues really quickly. And I tell you what, getting that histamine diet in just to help with symptom control, your patients will love you. I know it's not treating the cause at the beginning, but if you get the symptoms down, they will have a lot of relief in their symptoms. And then you can work on all the causes. So, I just want to give you a common presentation of what a sort of normal histamine patient looks like. And I know everyone is different, but there's kind of like a classic histamine patient. Now, their gut won't be good. And as we know, gut health is super important for overall health. It's crazy. Once you get the gut working like clockwork, your health really does start to improve. So even if it's a bit niggly. A bit of indigestion. Bowels are a bit funny. You know, not going every day, every second day alternating. Hard to pass, right? Not good. So if you're not pooping, then you're not pooping out undigested food. Bad bacteria that can definitely create histamine issues. It might also be a red flag for SIBO. They probably have some skin issues. It might not be full blown eczema or hives. They might just be a bit sensitive. Bit itchy, right? Like itchy skin, itchy a shower, sensitive, a bit red. That's a sign of histamine and they might not have full blown migraines, but they get niggling headaches. They're just a headachy person. Their sleep is often not good. They've got a lot of wakefulness, they're not rested. And with women, if there's high histamine, 99 percent of the time, there's going to be issues with hormones. So with PMS and a worsening of any of these histamine symptoms at ovulation or before menstruation. So that's just a very common presentation. But again, I have a lot of patients with severe acne. With severe chronic reflux and heartburn. They've been on PPIs so it's bad and it's just histamine or that classic migraine. Migraine is so often histamine. So they're common presentations. But as I said, some people just have one, it might be mild, others have many, and they can be quite severe. We now need to chat about how histamine is broken down in the body. And I know that there are several enzymes. But clinically, I just really focus on these 2. And I've been doing it for 12 years now, and I just find that we need to focus on the On these 2 enzymes. We've got the DAO enzyme. The diamine oxidase enzyme. DAO enzyme and DAO deals with histamine that is outside the cell. It's in many organs of the body that I just often think about. Outside the cell it's in the gut. And when it comes to histamine, issues with the gut are a really big deal. It drives up a lot of histamine. And all this histamine being built up the gut, it's the DAO enzyme that's dealing with that histamine being produced in the gut. And it's the DAO enzyme that breaks down the histamine in food. Which is why people become very reactive to high histamine foods. I actually think that's where the term histamine intolerance comes from because people recognize that they have an intolerance to these common foods. Histamine N methyltransferase is the other enzyme. Now being a methyltransferase enzyme, it needs a methyl group for that enzyme to work. And we're going to be discussing a lot about methylation in upcoming episodes. But essentially, You need to create SAMe-- your body's major methyl donor, as that's the co factor for the histamine N methyltransferase enzyme. So the co factor just helps that enzyme work. Now, clinically, what's really important to know is that the DAO enzyme is absent in the central nervous system. So when it comes to breaking down histamine in the brain, we need methylation. So, wow, wouldn't you think? I'm going to give methylated B vitamins and or SAMe to someone with migraines and it will fix it. Well, I'm here to tell you that it often doesn't. And it can often make them worse because essentially you're breaking down the histamine really quickly and often not addressing the root cause of why you have high histamine in the brain in the first place. I know the brain makes histamine, but it's so often coming from the gut. It can come from the nasal cavity with something called MARCoNS. We'll learn all about MARCoNS in upcoming episodes. It can come from oestrogen. So you need to be addressing these root causes and not just jumping in with methyls to break down histamine really, really quickly. Now, if you're a patient or practitioner and you've done that and it's worked, fantastic. It can. But I'm just here to tell you that it can cause adverse reactions. So if that's happened to you, you probably do need to try and get to the root cause first. Get your histamines down. Get your gut fixed. Balance your hormones. And then going in with these methyls can help. They can potentially just come at the end. Just get rid of those niggly headaches or migraines. But if they're happening often. You usually need to be addressing the root cause first. So just to conclude, what exactly is histamine intolerance? And very simply, histamine intolerance is when histamine accumulation is beyond the body's capacity to break it down. Histamine intolerance is not a standalone condition. It's the symptom of an underlying health condition. And this is very important to understand. So to truly heal from histamine intolerance, you need to establish and treat the root causes. And following a low histamine diet is not treating the root cause. I'm sorry to say, I do see this all the time. People are starting to understand a little bit about histamine and they put their patients on a low histamine diet. They're told to stay on this for a few months and then reintroduce the foods and see. Well, it's not going to work. If you don't address the root causes, just removing the high histamine foods from your diet is not going to fix the root cause. It can help a lot with symptomatic control. But you don't want to be restricting these delicious foods, avocado, tomato, citrus. You can't even have a sip of alcohol. We need to understand that it's not a treatment, it's symptom control until we get to the root cause and treat those root causes. So histamine intolerance is common. Why? Because it follows inflammation. And what we see in our patient base every single day is chronic inflammation. Chronic illness is chronic inflammation. This is why histamine is such a widespread issue. Histamine intolerance or high histamine in the body is widespread globally. We're seeing it all the time. And as a practitioner, you really do need to understand histamine. It's like, you need to understand gut. If you're a hormone specialist, you need to understand gut. If you're a thyroid specialist, you need to understand gut. If you've got neurological issues, et cetera, it's the same with histamine because it's impacting so many systems in the body and it's caused from chronic inflammation. And trust me, if you start to understand histamine, you can just streamline your clinical protocols and practice so easily because there are like 15 causes of high histamine and commonly it's only about 4 or 5 that we're seeing in clinical practice every day. So you'll be able to say to your patients, I know what this is. I know what testing you need to do. You can get their histamine bucket down. They'll think you're a superstar. And what will they do? They'll refer you to their friends and family. They'll write you a five star review. It will really help your practice. And patients, I hear you. You're like far out. I've seen so many practitioners and they had no idea what it was. I spent a fortune and got nowhere. So it's really frustrating. It's just something that us practitioners really need to take seriously and get our heads around to help our patients. If you're suffering with histamine issues yourself, I totally understand your frustration and we're here to help with consults. So if you'd like a one on one consult, you can easily book in an appointment with us via my website joannekennedynaturopathy.Com. Or if you prefer to tackle it yourself or with your current practitioner, I have an e bundle, which is my ebook. It's over 90 pages. It's really well researched because I know that if you're going to take that to a doctor or another practitioner, they're going to want to see the research and it's there. It goes into what we've discussed today. It also goes into the major causes and I've included all the treatment options that I use in my clinical practice. Including supplements, dietary interventions, and that's all available on my website. Thank you everyone today for joining me on this deep dive into the science of histamine. And I hope this episode has given you a better understanding of the science of histamine, as well as the signs and symptoms that you need to watch for as a practitioner, or if you're someone with health issues. If you've enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe to the Histamine Well podcast. Leave a review or share it with someone who could benefit. If you have any questions you'd like answered or have a topic that you'd like me to discuss on future episodes, please go to my website joannekennedynaturopathy.Com, where you can provide us with that information. I'll see you next time where I discuss the root causes of high histamine, including gluten intolerance, SIBO, mould, oxalates, and much more. Until then, take care and be well.