So Long, Cocoa, My Old Friend (Month 2, Day 39)

Have you seen the movie Labyrinth? The part where the girl realizes that the Goblin King (David Bowie) can't actually control her anymore and she says "You have no power over me!" and the whole world collapses.

I can now look squarely at a bar of chocolate and say "you have no power over me."  What a great feeling!  Of course it doesn't mean that I don't get the occasional twinge for a hit of chocolate truffle.  But it's not overwhelming...it doesn't interfere with my reality - not a support beam.

Why isn't chocolate in my diet?  Well, I looked on my handy-dandy foods with histamine list and it was on there, by golly!  With a little digging I found this cryptic blurb:

Food allergy to cocoa appears to be rare although occupational allergy in workers exposed to cocoa dust has been reported (Zuskin et al. 1998 [806]; Perfetti et al. 1997 [808]). However, self-reported allergy to cocoa appears to be common (Brugman et al. 1998 [809]). Because of this cocoa has been included in studies of the prevalence of food allergy (Young et al. 1994 [810]) and DBPCFC has been used. 

It has been suggested that intolerance to cocao involves biogenic amines. However, Jansen et al. (2003) [805] found no evidence for this. Moller et al. (1984) [575] in a study of of penicillin allergy in occupationally exposed individuals showed cocoa to produce non-allergic histamine release in basophil mediator release test. Becker et al. (1981) [21] extracted a species of 20 -40 kDa (centred on 26 kDa) which activates the factor XII-dependent pathways. However, the inflamatory activity may involve polyphenols binding to complement and does not necessarily involve IgE.

So, chocolate basically can stimulate a histamine release, but it's questionable as to the extent of that release.  So, still not on my diet. Sigh...

Of course, many times people are allergic to all the OTHER stuff that goes into those delectable dark bars, but I'm talking really basic, good cocoa here.  See one of my first posts on my fave, really super duper quick and healthy chocolate recipe.  Unfortunately, there are many benefits to chocolate too.  I don't want to talk about those.

Today's Diet:

Water
1/4 c Smoothie/Manna with Earth Balance
Mint Tea
Rice with Cauliflower Dal, apple with cashew butter
Corn Nuts and 1/2 c leftover smoothie
Out to dinner: Garden salad with balsamic vinegar and olive oil, and french fries...
Totally forgot my pill!


Image: Slice of MIT

Allergy Season! (Month 2, Day 36)

It's that time again - springtime in New Mexico, when the pinion trees sweat pollen and the rabbitbrush throws the stuff out like a sneeze. Any building you go into, you'll see signs of the season - runny noses, red eyes, coughing, headaches.

But not me -aside from a slight runny nose, I have no allergy symptoms, which is actually really surprising!  The only thing that I can really say is different from this year and last is diet and supplementation.  Obviously, the INH is a new ingredient.

The diet is the big one though - the histamine-free diet. I can control the exposure coming in through my mouth, which means a lower dose of histamines in the body.  Granted, I can't eliminate all histamines, but my diet is pretty darn clean. (See the Histamine Page for more info on Histamines)

I'm on the first week still of my Histamine-free diet.  Unfortunately, my hands are just as bad as ever, even if my allergies are mild.  Does that mean that the arthritic symptoms in my hands are no relation to histamines?  Possibly, although everything I've read says it takes at least 2-3 weeks to lower histamine levels in the body.

Again, no idea how it all works.  All I know is that I feel relatively good for all the yellow stuff in the air, and I plan on staying on the diet for another 2 weeks.  It's not as bad as it sounds!

Today's Diet:
32oz water
Breakfast: 2 slices Manna bread with homemade cashew butter
3 vitamins
Chai tea with Stevia and coconut cream
Lunch: Pea soup and vitamins
Snack: 3 rice cakes
Home snack: Corn chips and apple salsa
Dinner: Steamed cauliflower, romaine salad with rice cheese shred, sunflower sprouts, hemp seed and goddess dressing
Dessert: Applesauce
Pre-bed: Pollen and the Pill

Picture source

Month 1, Day 30

Eureka!  INH can actually induce arthritis!

But wait, let me back up...Last week I went to Public Health for my second visit and an INH refill.  My sweet nurse asked me a few questions, weighed me (I've happily lost 3 pounds) and then got me another bottle of INH.  When I told her that I think INH has caused me to have arthritis she was surprised.  "Really?  And you've never had it before?  Who told you that you had arthritis?"

Well, truth be told, I've self-diagnosed.  In the past, the only times I've felt these arthritic-like symptoms was when I drink wine or beer.  The next morning my hands and joints ache and are incredibly weak.  About my third week in to INH, my hands started aching in EXACTLY THE SAME WAY.  But it didn't go away as the day progressed...my hands just ache all the time.

So I explained this to my sweet babushka nurse and she wanted to try B6 even though I get 1000% B6 in my multivitamin.  She teetered out and brought back a B6 that gave me 2000% in one pill.  "Try this without taking your multivitamin for a week and see if it helps.  If not, go ahead and start the multivitamin again."

It hasn't helped...not one bit. So I'm taking my multi again slightly early.  It hasn't been quite a week.  Only 5 days.  My hands feel exactly the same.

The good news it that I've made some connections:
1. INH can, in fact, induce arthritis.  There are studies in which it induced acute arthritis, and when the patient when off, the symptoms disappeared.  When started again, the symptoms reappeared. (Source 1), (Source 2)
2. Since my symptoms pre-INH usually appeared after wine/beer, two high-histamine liquids, and since INH inhibits histamine metabolism, it may be that my histamine intake is exceeding my metabolism of histamine, and adding to the arthritic feeling in my hands. In fact, histamine has been associated with arthritis - causing the joints to become "leaky" allowing the arthritic process to start. (Source)

So from here - I'm going to try an experiment. Remove all (or as many as possible - nearly impossible to remove every bit of histamine - See the Histamine Page for more info) histamine foods from my diet.  This really sucks because I really like a lot of them:
* Certain vegetables: tomato, spinach, eggplant, avocado, mushrooms and canned vegetables as well as commercially prepared salads
* Certain fruits: strawberries, bananas, papayas, kiwi, pineapple, mango, tangerines, grapefruits, red prunes, pea
* Red wine vinegar, balsamic vinegar
* Soy sauce
* Sunflower seeds
* Chocolate/cocoa
* Coffee, black tea
* Some fruits: citrus, bananas, strawberries, red prunes, pears, kiwi, raspberries, papaya
* Peanuts, cashews, walnuts

Yep - I'm going to be hurtin' because I have tomatoes and avocados practically every day.  I eat bananas and cocoa all the time.  I love balsamic vinegar.  I include strawberries, kiwi and oranges in my diet frequently. I drink black tea in the form of chai daily.

This sucks - but it sucks worse to have my hands hurt.  It's worth a try for a few weeks to see what happens.
I'll keep you posted.