DEE!

[faithberry]

Hi Dee,

Here's my input on potential hive inducers from your menu:

Rice Chex & banana
pear
I baked chicken breasts, topped with olive oil, fresh garlic, sage & thyme
After they were baked I picked those apart and added the meat, drippings, and the roasted garlic to tinky'ada brown rice fetticinni noodles & steamed broccoli & asparagus.
A few GF/DF/SF sugar cookies
A few GF/DF/SF pretzels
About 8 oz. of fresh brewed ice tea

My thoughts on most likely suspects:
Banana
Pear
Broccoli (a high histamine vegie)
Tea

Bananas and pears are not on histamine restricted diet from ICUS, but they are on the list from 'Histame' (that list is in my journal). I don't have hives, but I have histamine problems and I do get reactions to both bananas and pears. Bananas at least contain tyramine, which use the same detoxification pathway, but both bananas and pears are on the Histame list as containing or inducing histamine reactions.

If the Rice Chex happen to contain BHT or BHA as a preservative, then you have another histamine liberator. Sometimes they inject it into the plastic wrap instead of the food, so it doesn't have to be listed on the box then.

If you happen to be sensitive to salicylates (another type of diet restriction that helps some people with hives per ICUS), then the herbs are definitely high salicylate as is the brocolli.

Some people have a problem with garlic, but I'm not sure why.

Of course, the cookies and pretzels could also have suspect ingredients, but without the ingredient list there's no way to know.

Since it seems like a pretty big reaction, I suspect that more than one of those foods is involved. My suggestions would be to try eating very simple meals for awhile with just 2 or 3 foods so it's easier to track down the culprits.

I would really, really love to know what anesthetic or hypnotic was used, as there are quite a few drugs that are histamine liberators. Please do ask your GI doc!!!!! Naturally, you'll want to keep track of any drugs you react to.

Also, since your system was already possibly overload with histamine from the anasthetic, this may have made you more sensitive to the other foods since this is a cumulative problem.

So sorry you have to deal with this.

[Dee]

Thanks for the info Faith!
But, I have to admit, that today, I have a very piss poor attitude!!
Like, Gee!!!! Why don't I just quit eating!!!!!!
This attitude is very rare for me as I am usually an upbeat, jovial person!!
My self talk is saying, sure, eliminate more foods from your diet so you can look even more like a stick person!!!!! I recently was fortunate to put on a couple more pounds and I'm not about to eliminate anything else!!!
Forgive me for the negativity and it definitely is "not" pointed at you or anybody else!!!


Dee~~~~~

[faithberry]

I totally understand how you feel. I was 85 lbs and could only eat a handful of foods. Still can only eat a handful of foods, but at least have gained weight! It's so much to have to deal with MC alone, but to add this hives problem on top, well no wonder why you have a negative attitude today! I can offer a few tips because I've studied the histamine thing a lot, but maybe that's not even the problem for you. So don't worry, I don't take it personally. Hope it just all goes away like Polly suggested!

[tex]

Faith,

I find the ambiguity among various "allowed" and "not allowed" lists relative to histamine issues to be more than a little confusing. For example, as you mentioned, the ICUS list specifically allows pears and bananas, and while it doesn't specifically allow broccoli, it does not include it in a "restricted" list, either. It's no wonder there's lot of confusion about this topic, (before we even consider a possible salicylate connection). And, as Dee inferred, by the time one eliminates all of the potential protein intolerances that we might be sensitive to, and all the known "irritants", (lettuce, onions, garlic, fiber in general, etc.), and certain foods that we might be sensitive to on an individual basis, that doesn't leave much room for any more sweeping eliminations.

It opens the question of whether or not some of us truly are intolerant of virtually all food. Sometimes, the more we learn, the more confused we get, and I find this subject to be more than a little confusing.

Tex

[starfire]

Tex, if you are confused I know I don't even stand a REMOTE chance!!!

[faithberry]

Tex,

The book that is the source of the ICUS diet was published in 1988. Understandably, it's not going to be the final word on histamine-restriction because there's always new research. Also, histamine isn't a stable factor. Amounts can vary depending upon the age of a particular food, for example. The Vickerstaff-Joenja book is used as a reference often, so I think it's fairly reliable. The Histame.com site also has a list of 'helpful tips,' which are helpful. They explain why bread and confectioneries are typically a problem because they contain yeast.

It can be confusing. I've found you need to really study all the information and correlate the lists to truly understand this. It's not easy because there is no conclusive information. Is the diet quite restrictive? Yes!

You said:

It opens the question of whether or not some of us truly are intolerant of virtually all food.

I think that may very well be possible for some of us. If you have food chemical intolerance or a mast cell problem and MC, it's really difficult!!!! That's the position I think I'm in.

There's a hospital in Australia with an allergy unit that has designed a low food chemical diet-low in amines, salicylates and glutamates. They say if you are sensitive to one natural food chemical, it's likely you are sensitive to others as well and additives too. So yes, some people may be intolerant to many foods. They've devised an elimination diet to help people determine if they are sensitive to food chemicals; histamine is just one of them! You can read the overview here:

www.cs.nsw.gov.au/RPA/Allergy/default.htm

These are some of the symptoms they list:

Symptoms triggered by food chemical intolerances vary from person to person. The commonest ones are recurrent hives and swellings, headaches, sinus trouble, mouth ulcers, nausea, stomach pains and bowel irritation. Some people feel vaguely unwell, with flu-like aches and pains, or get unusually tired, run-down or moody, often for no apparent reason.

They have 20 years of experience and research. They give considerable credence to salicylate problems, whereas Vickerstadd-Joneja has a different view on that. I got the booklets for the elimination diet and it has been helpful in reducing my symptoms. But I still cannot eat most of the foods on the low list so there's more going on. Still trying to figure it out!

Their theory of food intolerances says:

They are triggered by food chemicals which cause reactions by irritating nerve endings in different parts of the body, rather in the way that certain drugs can cause side-effects in sensitive people.

They say they are not an immune reaction. Sometimes I definitely feel like a raw nerve ending!

The Failsafe Diet by Sue Dengate is the same as the hospital diet...
www.fedupwithfoodadditives.info/

So there's yet another theory about food intolerance!

It is confusing and I've been trying to sort out for quite a few years now why I'm never able to expand my ability to eat more foods. For a long time I thought it was the food chemical problem, but more recently I got on to the possibility of mast cell activation disorder. Of course, there's also the MC, but does anyone with MC have food intolerance problems that never resolve?

And here's the whole elimination diet:
http://www.plantpoisonsandrottenstuff.i ... -diet.aspx

You see there are many 'low' foods that someone with MC would not eat...cabbage, brussel sprouts, celery....The booklets from the hospital are even more helpful because they list low to very high foods in groups. But not sure that is even my problem, although it does include histamine.

Some people are born with a sensitive constitution and react more readily to food chemicals than others. The tendency is probably inherited, but environmental triggers — a sudden change of diet, a bad food or drug reaction, a nasty viral infection (for example, gastroenteritis, glandular fever) — can bring on symptoms at any age by altering the way the body reacts to food chemicals. Women often become more sensitive in their child-bearing years, perhaps due to hormonal changes, which might be nature’s way of preventing pregnant and breast-feeding women from eating foods that could harm the developing baby.

Gastroenteritis can bring this on though so there could be a connection to MC for some.

I hope I haven't confused people by even introducing the topic here!!!! So sorry if I have and sorry for all the disconnected rambling.

[tex]

Of course, there's also the MC, but does anyone with MC have food intolerance problems that never resolve?

Excellent question. Personally, I think the answer is no, if MC is the only issue, but there's no way of knowing if that answer is definitive, because the jury is still out. The problem is that MC is rarely the only issue, because it is a result of a wide variety of adverse events in the body, besides being responsible for additional adverse events. IOW, MC is triggered by some other issue, it doesn't just "happen", for no reason, (though sometimes we may not know the reason). Obviously, unless the issues that triggered MC in the first place are resolved, then it would seem unlikely that MC would be resolvable.

At least that's the way I see it. As Ernest Hemingway might say, (or rather, John Donne, the author of the poem, No man is an Island, which was used as a prologue for Hemingway's "For Whom The Bell Tolls"), no disease is an island.

Tex