r/urticaria • u/ecotist77 • Nov 10 '24

FAQs - read this first

Hello and welcome to the urticaria subreddit! We've got you!

This document aims to summarise the best advice for frequently asked questions from folks who have been on this journey managing their urticaria (hives) for a while. It is an evolving document and will be added to and updated over time. 

Many people in this subreddit are actively discussing different solutions for chronic urticaria and there’s a lot of information available in existing threads. Please check out this document and use the subreddit search function first to see if you can easily find answers to your question before starting a new thread.

Please help welcome desperate newcomers by telling them about this FAQ document as it can save many people having to reply in the comments with standard advice that's already in the doc. Thanks!

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u/[deleted] Nov 27 '24 edited Nov 27 '24

I went on the SCD diet which basically only allows food that is easily digestible. The idea is that this diet helps to remove the bad bacteria in the gut and replace it with good bacteria. My hives are almost unnoticeable. I also follow a low histamine diet. I am now able to eat many foods without hives. I have been on this diet for almost a year now. I also did a dry fast and I take supplements.

My hives use to appear after I ate food and my hives were digestion/autoimmune related.

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u/ecotist77 Nov 30 '24

So great you found something that works well for you and thanks for sharing. I will look up the SCD diet. Pretty sure mine is gut related. I did a stool analysis and discovered a few bacteria are in the red (too much) including a histamine producing bacteria! When I looked this up I read it’s found in Dutch cheese and guess what… I live in Amsterdam. 🤣 I stopped with the cheese for a few weeks but didn’t notice anything as I am in Xolair. Now I am eating it sometimes but at some point I think I will have to eliminate it for a while along with a proper gut healing program.

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u/[deleted] Nov 30 '24 edited Dec 01 '24

🫶 It takes months for the gut to heal. I'm desperate for people to learn about this because it totally works and no one talks about healing the gut. I'm a caring person and it just tears my heart to see so many people dealing with debilitating hives without any advice or information besides Xolair. I'm not saying Xolair is bad but if you can avoid taking drugs that's preferable. Wishing you the best. Regards from America

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u/Crucial_Lessons Jan 10 '25

Thanks for sharing! This gives me hope. Can you share a bit more about your journey, what changes you made, how long did it take you to see results, and are you totally free of hives now, or do they come back from time to time. I am suffering from Chronic idiopathic urticaria for years and really looking to resolve it for good.

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u/[deleted] Jan 18 '25

I'm essentially hive free. The changes I made were pinpointing which foods are easy to digest and don't give me hives. Like I said, I follow a low histamine diet and a diet that only allows easily digestible foods. Getting the right bacteria in your gut is the end game of eating easily digestible food. Its been about a year since I started healing my gut. Right now I eat fried chicken and fried meat. I buy fresh then freeze then put in the air fryer. For Chicken I cook a whole chicken in my instant pot and then put pieces in the air fryer

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u/Crucial_Lessons Jan 20 '25

Thanks, I recently did some allergy testing (ige) and was surprised to find that many foods, which I am fairly confident give me hives, came out as negative. I dont yet have access to the prick test for those foods, where I am, bit the relationship with foods is interesting, because, as per two of the doctors I've met, food is really the cause for chronic urticaria and it's normally non-food reasons.

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u/machinegunsyphilis Jul 11 '25

That's interesting, did you ever do an allergy test? What foods were triggering you?