What Is The Relationship Between Histamine and Hormones?

 

 In my clinical work I am always trying to get to the root cause of symptoms and join up the dots. While we might not often associate hormones with histamine/allergies, there is a close relationship between the two.

Histamine

Histamine forms an essential part of our immune system. However, when the body can’t ‘keep up’ with the histamine response, we can start to see symptoms such as light-headedness, anxiety, headaches, rashes, and even digestive upset.

Symptoms Of Histamine Release

Histamine is in all our tissues and is mostly stored in the mast cells. Histamine is vital for our health and a very important part of our immune system, however sometimes the symptoms can feel problematic. When we start to release histamine at a pace the body can’t keep up with we can see:

  • Mucus Production

  • Redness

  • Rashes

  • Headaches

  • Light Headedness

  • Anxiety

  • Heart Palpitations

  • GI Upset

Oestrogen

Oestrogen is a collection of metabolites which are crucial for heart, bone and reproductive health. Oestrogen can actually encourage histamine release by interacting with the mast cells that store histamine. It can also supress the enzyme that the body uses to break down histamine. This is fine if your oestrogen levels are normal however if your oestrogen levels are high or your oestrogen/progesterone balance is off, excess histamine release may be coming from oestrogen. This is also worth considering for those who have fibroids or endometriosis.


Progesterone

 Progesterone also has a relationship with mast cells and histamine. Progesterone helps supress histamine release in the body which may be worth noting if you have PCOS or are perimenopausal.

 

The relationship between your hormones and histamine is complicated and goes to show how important it is to work holistically and join up the dots. If you are experiencing excess histamine symptoms, it may be worth allergy testing along with hormone testing.

 

If you’d like to book a discovery call to discuss working on supporting healthy hormone levels, you can do so here www.michaellamazzoninutrition.com/discovery call

Michaella Mazzonihistamine, high histamine foods, estrogen dominance symptoms, pcos, pcos and allergies, menopause and allergies, cambridge nutritionist, online nutritionist, Edinburgh nutritionist