Hey y’all 🙂 

If you’ve been following me for a while, you’ll know that the current scientific evidence points toward ADHD symptom severity not being statistically significantly affected by food dyes and additives, except in the cases of taking in over the recommended daily limit [hence…our nutritional guidelines!]. Despite this consistent research, we continue to have anecdotal reports of certain dyes affecting ADHD symptoms such as external hyperactivity. It’s possible that these reports come from expectation effects since we’ve had this strong messaging against food dyes and ADHD for a long time now; however, science does what science does when it hears conflicting information:

It researches it.

So, let’s get into it 🫡 

[P.S. In my upcoming nutritional ADHD Patreon, you’ll get access to lots of digestible information, just like my resource on the current literature regarding ADHD and food dye! Stay tuned - it’s releasing at the end of the month!]

Histamine Genes, Food Dyes, and ADHD

You might me asking me, “Why the heck do we care about histamine with ADHD?” That was my first reaction when I started researching ADHD and histamine a while ago. After all, I’ve been told my whole life that histamine is only relevant if I had MCAS. The funny thing about our bodies, though, is that they are quite complex and all of our functions work synergistically together in a dynamic way. This includes histamine.

For instance, in rat models, we’ve found that the receptor H3 is largely connected to hyperactivity and dopamine release. Histamine in general also seems to play a part in ADHD, as histamine depletion in the brain seems to be correlated with neurological disorders, with theories indicating that more histamine in the brain could improve symptoms of ADHD.

WHAT?

Isn’t histamine supposed to be a bad thing? Well, again it all comes down to the location and how the body is able to use it. In the neuronutritional field, we consider histamine to actually be a neurotransmitter. Just like any neurotransmitter, too little, too much, or gene polymorphisms regarding their receptors can either improve or exacerbate different mental health conditions. Regarding histamine, in general layman’s terms, too little histamine in the brain can exacerbate symptoms (it’s more complicated that this, but that’s the truth generally).

It’s curious, however, since too much serum histamine (i.e. histamine in the body, not the brain) is associated with worsened ADHD symptoms. To make it even more confusing, the current working theory in the ADHD nutrition space is that it’s less about histamine and more about having ineffective or dysregulated levels of something called DAO - an enzyme that breaks down histamine.

Anyway, I want you to keep all of this in mind as I break down this current study on ADHD, food dye, and histamine receptor polymorphisms. After all, this is a really complicated topic at the end of the day.

Alright! Now that we have all that out of the way, this was a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial - our gold-standard of scientific research.

Ok, so what does all this really mean?

It means that if you go get genetic testing and you have the HNMT T939C gene polymorphism, then it may be wise for you to try to avoid the specific food dyes yellow 6, yellow 13, red 3, and red 40.

However, I want to emphasize that this was only done in children and that we do not have any technical generalizability to adults at this time. Even so, this could be one reason why some kids with ADHD seem to react to certain food additives: they have a gene polymorphism that affects their histamine.

This all being said, the possible effects of histamine and food dye on ADHD may be mediated simply by eating enough vitamin C. We find that vitamin C is an effective regulatory nutrient regarding histamine, and seeing as a lot of people with ADHD don’t eat lots of fruits and veggies (where most of our vitamin C comes from), this is a great starting point.

As always, I will advocate for adding in our nutrients before worrying about subtracting different foods. Lots of people with ADHD thrive better on this mindset, especially since for a majority of people, foods with dyes are their ‘safe foods.’ If you are able to eat your food-dye riddled cereal with a glass of orange juice, you’re already doing better.

Try not to worry too much about the small things. Eventually they will get squeezed out by more nutritious options as you continue to work on your health journey. The stress that you experience worrying about the small things you’re trying to restrict is undoing the progress you’re trying to make. Trust me - as a person who’s studied nutrition and psychology, restriction is one of the most unhelpful first steps when we’re focused on long-term physical and mental health.

Thanks for reading!

If you have any thoughts, questions, or comments, be sure to shoot me a DM on Instagram @Nutrimindcoach or simply reply to this email. I LOVE hearing from you!

Don’t forget to tune into this week’s episode of my podcast: Approaching Brain Fog Holistically - I chat with Hashmin, a recent intern from the Center for Nutritional Psychology about her food journey and our current scientific understanding of brain fog. We break down what to do: nutrition, stress, herbs, and more. Click the button below to listen!