I believe it was around 2018 when I came across an article online that suggested that taking riboflavin (vitamin B-2) was helpful for people with gluten sensitivity when they ate something containing gluten. I have always been a believer in vitamins and supplements so it was not much of a stretch for me to believe that. I had taken it in the past as part of a regular routine but never more than the suggested dosage. I decided to order a bottle of 400 mg riboflavin capsules and experiment with it.
After a while I developed a pretty effective protocol that actually worked. I would have to “front load” my riboflavin by taking a dose early on the days I planned to eat something containing gluten. I would spread the dosage out through the day leading up to the time when I planned to indulge. On average I would take five or six 400 mg riboflavin capsules an hour or two apart and that would almost always do the trick. I could eat any amount of anything you can imagine containing gluten and would not get a headache.
It was a strange experience because even though I would not get a headache, I often felt like I was going to get one. There were certain clues my body would always give me that warned me that a gluten-induced headache was on the way. Although I would feel those signs come on, a headache just would not develop. Those feelings were not painful or particularly unpleasant so I was happy with the results. Even so, I did not make gluten consumption an everyday thing. I wondered about what the effects might be from “overdosing” on riboflavin even though I was not able to find anything that suggested it was dangerous. Still, I did not want to do it all the time and limited it to weekends and special occasions. It worked well, but at the same time it gave me the somewhat odd feeling that my body was actually fighting off the headache each time. That, along with taking a capsule every hour or two was enough for me to limit using that particular solution. It surely did not feel like a bona fide “cure.”
During the fall of 2020 I stumbled onto some information online suggesting that “heirloom” flour was a lot more tolerable for people who had gluten sensitivity. For obvious reasons, that really caught my attention. I spent some time researching it online and decided that there may have been something to it. So, I placed an order for it online since I thought that was the only place I could get it. It was expensive compared to the typical flour one finds in the supermarket. For just two pounds of Jovial brand Einkorn Heirloom flour it was almost $12.00 but for me it would be well worth it if it would not give me a headache.
I was surprised and delighted to find that I could indeed tolerate things made with this newly-discovered flour and that was not the only benefit. Not only was I able to consume things made with it without consequence, it also made things better. I noticed immediately that almost everything my wife made with this flour was just better. The improved texture of things was one of the most obvious differences but it also seemed to just taste better. I suspect it is because it is an ancient flour that has not been manipulated by man to “improve” it and is also grown organically as nature intended. I soon found out that it was available in a local supermarket for a much more reasonable price and we have been buying it ever since.
It was hard for me to believe that I actually discovered a wheat flour that did not bother me. It begs the question: What in the Hell are they doing to the typical flour one finds in the supermarket as well as all the commercial baked products found in those same stores, restaurants and other places where food is sold and served? Beyond the nasty glyphosate used to dry wheat before harvest, I suspect they have done other things over the years to “hybridize” it and make it much worse for people that cannot tolerate gluten.
While the discovery of heirloom flour was a true game changer for me, I should also point out that I was not able to go completely crazy with it. If I really overdid it I could still end up with a headache. However, that did not happen unless I really pushed the limits and consumed a lot more than a reasonable portion. The headaches that I did experience a time or two were not quite as bad as they would have been from something made from regular flour.
Even with the discovery of this new miracle flour, I still would take a little extra riboflavin when I planned to eat something made with it. It was not a requirement but just made me feel a little better about it and I surely was not taking anywhere near the amount I took when I was using it as a preventive for eating things made with typical flour.
While it was fantastic for me to be able to eat all kinds of treats made with heirloom flour, I was still not able to eat things after a certain hour of the evening and it did not solve my problems with consuming things purchased from stores or restaurants made with standard flour. I could continue with my riboflavin over-dosing if I wanted to but I did so only rarely. I also still had problems eating things like chocolate and other things I mentioned previously, no matter what the hour of the day.
I did experiment with using riboflavin to solve those problems but it just did not seem very effective for me so most of the time it was like gambling when I wanted to eat one of those things. Sometimes I would be fine and experience no consequences whatsoever and at other times I would be hit with that familiar headache. There seemed to be no way to predict when it would happen and when it would not.
Over time I did more research and stumbled onto more clues that would eventually lead me to a complete and total cure. It seemed impossible to even imagine such a thing just a year ago but it was a gradual learning process that took a few years to work out and eventually discover the necessary clues.
One of the major breakthrough discoveries was when I learned that my headaches were almost certainly the result of excess histamine in my body that was caused by certain things I ate. Some foods contained high amounts of histamine and others caused my body to react to them by releasing more histamine than was needed. My body was not processing and clearing the histamine from my system like it does for most people. Too much histamine can cause things like a runny nose, itching and gastrointestinal problems but for me it only resulted in headaches.
What I wondered about next was just why my body was not able to properly process histamine like most people are able to. The next revelation was the discovery that for many people, it is caused by a deficiency of something called DAO or diamine oxidase. I was not certain that was my problem but it seemed like a very plausible possibility. DAO is absolutely crucial for processing histamine and without enough of it, one is likely to experience excess levels that cause all kinds of problems, including headaches.
When I found that it was possible to purchase DAO supplements I ordered some immediately so I could find out if DAO deficiency was the root of my problems. When it arrived a week or so later I put it to the test. I took two capsules before I had something that would most likely result in a headache. I cannot recall exactly what it was that I ate but my best guess would be chocolate since that was one of my most reliable headache producers.
I was surprised and quite pleased to wake up the next morning with no trace of a headache. I knew that sometimes happened even if I did not take any measures to mitigate a headache so more experiments were in order. Subsequent experiments were mostly successful and definitely provided me with the evidence that proved this supplement was something that was making a real difference. In this case, the supplement I was using was powdered beef kidney. It contains the DAO my body was obviously lacking so consuming it before I ate some troublesome food would provide my body with that additional DAO that I lacked. It was working.
Eventually I dialed in the right dosage and timing, which pretty well eliminated my headaches from eating chocolate and other sugary treats that would often sentence me to hours of headache pain. However, there were times that it would not work as well as it usually did and I would end up with what I would describe as a “breakthrough” headache. They were usually mild but still unpleasant to endure for hours. The DAO supplement was a very good solution and worked the majority of the time but this was not the cure I had hoped it would be. Another problem was that they were on the expensive side and were costing around $40 for 200 capsules. I would usually end up taking six or eight of them when I would eat something problematic and I went through them faster than I expected.
Still, I was grateful to have a pretty good solution for those problems. I was still able to enjoy many things made with the heirloom flour but I did wonder if the DAO supplements might be effective in a similar way that riboflavin had been when I ate something made with standard, commercialized flour. I never really put it to the test since I did not have the occasion to be consuming a lot of those types of things and it was pretty easy to resist them when I was around them. After all, I had things like chocolate and ice cream I could have to satisfy those cravings for sweet treats.
My search for a genuine cure continued as I learned a bit more about histamine, DAO and how it behaves in the body. Many of those that suffer with the symptoms of excess histamine use the bucket analogy and I found it to be useful way to look at the problem. As one encounters things that cause histamine in the body to rise, it is useful to envision a bucket where it collects. As long as the bucket is not filled to the point of overflow, everything is fine. But since people like myself are unable to process histamine properly, it is much easier to overfill that bucket and that is when the problems begin.
This was useful to me since it helped explain the way my body reacted at various times. I could sometimes get away with having some chocolate without consequence because the histamine bucket was not near to the point of overflow when I ate it. At other times the bucket was closer to being full and would overflow even from a small portion of something I ate that I thought I would get away with. It would have been useful to be able to measure how much histamine was already in the bucket at any given time but that just isn’t possible. I am sure there must be medical tests that can measure it but that doesn’t help on a given Saturday evening when I’m contemplating a chocolate candy bar.
As you might expect, someone with my particular problems with histamine has a tendency to think about that quite a bit and wonder if a true cure exists. I had no interest in any potential solutions that Big Pharma might someday offer since I trust them less than I would trust a coiled rattle snake. I knew benzodiazepines like clonazepam offered a solution but there was no way I was going back on that stuff for that reason.
But one day I really got to wondering why in the world clonazepam alleviated my symptoms when I ate something I shouldn’t have or had something a bit too late in the evening. Surely there had to be some particular mechanism of action that was responsible for that reaction. I began to search online for an answer and as we all now know, AI can really speed up and streamline that process. I queried AI about it and it returned a fascinating answer that was the key to unlocking the puzzle and leading me to a true cure.
It revealed to me that some benzodiazepines, including clonazepam, can be effective as MAST cell stabilizers. I had recalled reading about the involvement of MAST cells where excess histamine is concerned. MAST cells are an absolutely essential component of the immune system that helps defend the body from foreign invaders by releasing histamine. When I then explained my symptoms to AI, it concluded that I very likely have MAST Cell Activation Syndrome otherwise known as MCAS. Finally, I had an actual name for my condition! For whatever reasons, it made me feel a little better about my problems after learning it actually had a name. It was something I had wondered about for years.
Understanding that MCAS was my problem and that my MAST cells tend to be a bit too “jumpy” when it came to releasing histamine was another revelation. And the fact that clonazepam—as a MAST cell stabilizer—was incredibly helpful led me to another question: Are there any other more natural substances or supplements that are also MAST cell stabilizers?
The answer was yes and at the very top of the list was quercetin. AI informed me that quercetin is as effective or even more effective as a MAST cell stabilizer than any benzodiazepine. My natural first response was to doubt that. It could not be that easy. Well, it turned out that it was indeed exactly that easy.
I am not a beginner when it comes to supplements and have tried numerous supplements over the years. I guess I have always been a bit of a “biohacker” and have had some success in the past treating various conditions with supplements. I am pretty sure I tried quercetin at some point in the past but not for the purpose of addressing my MCAS problems and most likely in small doses that would not have helped all that much.
Without delay I ordered some powdered quercetin and found that since it does not taste particularly unpleasant, I could just pop a bit in my mouth and swallow it with water. If anything, the taste of it reminds me of what sucking on a used teabag would taste like. Not all that bad. I started taking between 300 and 500 mg of powdered quercetin twice a day and continued with my DAO supplements when I was going to eat something that had the potential to give me problems.
My experience with using riboflavin for my gluten sensitivity taught me about the potential benefit of not rushing things. I would have to take riboflavin for hours before I could enjoy the effect that it had so I held off jumping in too quickly to test whether or not quercetin would be helpful for me. I figured it could take a while to build up on my body enough to protect me, if it could actually accomplish that.
After a couple of weeks or so I decided it was time to put it to the test. I went ahead and indulged in some treats that were well known for giving me trouble but I did not prepare myself as I usually would by taking the DAO supplements. Lo and behold, I awoke the next morning with no sign of a headache. Since it could have been one of those times when I would have gotten away with it without any help from quercetin or any other supplement, a repeat of the experiment was clearly in order.
Once again, I sailed through the process without a trace of headache. It seemed like I was onto something. Every subsequent time I tested it, the result was the same. There was no question that quercetin alone had the same effect clonazepam had on me years ago. It was hard for me to believe (to say the least) but I was elated to have discovered that had the potential to eat like a normal person. At that point I still did not know just how good it was.
Although it seemed to banish my problems with certain things like chocolate and other things that gave me trouble in the past and also allowed me to eat those things at any time of the day, I was not sure it would help much with my reactions to gluten. I was a little gun shy about trying that since I did not want to deal with the aftermath if it failed. So, I was content for a while to just enjoy my newfound ability to eat many formerly problematic foods anytime I wanted.
Eventually I worked up the nerve to start testing quercetin against my reaction to gluten. I had doubts but the first few small-scale tests were promising. I would try having a single portion of a biscuit or muffin and wait to see what happened. When I experienced no negative reactions I would ramp it up a little more and find that I was still unbothered. One day at a social event I decided to really put it to the test. Regular old pizza was being offered along with some very decadent-looking cupcakes from a store or bakery. I ended up having two pieces of pizza and one of those cupcakes. Not all that long ago I would have almost certainly started to feel the effects a short time later and would have soon been in the throes of a pretty epic headache that would have lasted for the rest of the day and probably a good portion of the overnight.
Very rarely do I ever indulge in any store-purchased baked goods and I don’t have pizza all that often but it was clearly an opportunity for a pretty decisive experiment. When the function ended I returned home to wait it out. Once again, not a single trace of headache materialized. That pretty well settled it. I had finally discovered the cure and although that is a strong word, I feel it is completely justified. Just two doses of powdered quercetin per day have eliminated headaches from my life.
Up to that point I did not believe that every headache I ever had was related to something I ate but now I wonder. There were times I would get a headache that seemed to have no connection at all to something I ate. I was certain that I would sometimes get headaches from stress or perhaps lack of sleep but that seems more doubtful now. Headaches were not something that were rare for me for all of my adult life. I did not have them every day but I would say that I would have one once a week or so and now it appears they may have all been related to what I was eating.
For me to say that I have not had a single headache of any severity for at least six months is something I did not expect to ever say, but that is the case. To me it seems truly remarkable for one supplement to have done that much good for me. Quercetin is my miracle supplement and I suspect it could be for other MCAS sufferers as well.
I am not pretending that solving my MCAS problem is anywhere near as profound as a blind person regaining their vision but for me it is still quite a remarkable turn of events. Sometimes I just pause and realize that I can now eat like a “normal” person and it still amazes me. It does not matter what I eat or when I eat it—I no longer pay the price by having to endure a headache.
I am still curious about why I was helped so much by taking a DAO supplement if my MAST cells are the main problem. The fact that quercetin has cured me suggests that is the case but I do have a theory that AI appears to agree with. People with MCAS also tend to have a DAO deficiency and that, along with MCAS, work together to bring histamine levels above where they should be. When I would eat something that contained histamine it would combine with the excess histamine that was released from my overactive MAST cells to flood my body with histamine. My particular reaction to that, for whatever reason, was to develop a headache. The DAO supplement greatly reduced the histamine that resulted from something I ate so there was less of it to combine with the histamine my MAST cells released, which caused that bucket to overflow.
I now feel like I can enjoy eating normally for the rest of my days and I am extremely grateful that I had access to the internet, which allowed me to discover my cure. I am also grateful to the people who made that information available to anyone who looked for it. I am grateful to the scientists that work to figure these kinds of things out and to the average folks that experimented and shared the results. It is in that spirit that I wanted to share my experience and hope that it helps others.