Let’s Chat: Histamine, I despise you

By Linda Tooth on February 11, 2026.

Calling all perimenopausal and menopausal ladies, this article is for you. Have you spent days with sinuses that feel like they could explode, a nose that is running a marathon, using eye drops or taking allergy pills like they are candy to alleviate the itching in your eyes? Is your skin itchy? Most days I feel like I could scream with the discomfort this is causing me.

Imagine my joy when I came upon an article titled “This diet tweak cured my sinus issues in a day” in the Jan. 19, 2026 edition of Woman’s World magazine that offered a solution to these allergy symptoms.

For women like me going through this change you might be surprised to learn that hormonal shifts during this time in our lives can bring on allergy symptoms, and surprisingly, the culprit is foods high in histamine.

The article goes on to explain that histamine is a chemical that our body produces naturally and when we add foods that have histamine in them this can cause our body to not be able to break the histamine down fast enough. This in turn causes a buildup. From that buildup, allergy symptoms occur.

So how can we help ourselves? The obvious answer is to eliminate foods high in histamine. This is where my heart is broken because foods that I love are the issue. I start every morning with a cup of green tea and that is on the list.

Also on the list are black tea, aged cheese, yogurt, soy sauce, bacon, sausage, bananas, strawberries, sourdough bread, pickles, olives, hot dogs, chocolate, egg whites, wheat and yeast are just a few of the foods that should be eliminated.

Oh my god, no more green tea, nachos with cheese and olives, sandwiches, yogurt with a banana and granola for breakfast, deep fried pickles, bacon and eggs and Costco hot dogs.

Saying my life is not worth living is a bit dramatic, but it has forever changed, at least through menopause. Can somebody please tell me how long this time in my life lasts?

Can somebody also tell me what on earth I am supposed to eat for breakfast as I am sitting here eating the yogurt and bananas I bought? I thought I was doing a good thing when I bought a Cobb Salad for my lunch today, but guess what, there is blue cheese (my favorite) on the salad and aged cheese is a no-no.

Tonight, for supper is butter chicken with white rice and naan and bread is a no-no. Dear God, please help me.

You know, I have always felt that men have it easier in life and this is just another thing to prove that theory. Ladies, I will save that for another article.

Anyway, if you are following my partner’s health journey, we are off to Calgary on Thursday as his surgery is scheduled for Friday. Stay tuned as I will be sharing how this goes for us.

Have a Meowtastic Day and keep reading!

Linda Tooth is manager of philanthropy and volunteer engagement, YMCA of Southeastern Alberta