NEWPORT BEACH, CALIFORNIA: Former gymnast McKayla Maroney has opened up about her struggle with severe insomnia, claiming that she only slept ten days in three months before she discovered she was histamine intolerant.
The Olympic gold medalist opened up about her "wacko health issues" on Tuesday, October 3, on the Instagram page for her brand, Glowy - a venue Maroney created "for all things wellness, beauty, and mental health."
Maroney, 27, penned in her first update in a while, "Hey girl It’s been forever. Hopefully you had a hot girl summer because I definitely did not. I had a summer of severe insomnia."
"I slept a total of 10 days out of 3 months. I’d like to say it was a nightmare, but you have to sleep to have nightmares," the former gymnast added.
Maroney declared her retirement from gymnastics in 2016, and a year later she was one of the first athletes to criticize Larry Nassar, a man who was found guilty of sexual misconduct, per Daily Mail.
The disgraced former USA Gymnastics doctor is currently serving a maximum of 175 years in prison for abusing several female gymnasts, including some of the best athletes in the country.
Maroney and her 'Fierce Five' colleagues won the gold at the London 2012 Summer Olympics when she was barely 16 years old.
McKayla Maroney suffers from histamine intolerance
Maroney's post featured a collection of unsettling images, including one that appeared to be from a hospital and showed the gymnast with an IV in her arm.
She uploaded videos of herself sobbing about her insomnia as well as photographs of herself having blood taken and doing a food sensitivity test.
Maroney also provided pictures of the symptoms list she had kept on her phone as well as text messages concerning her insomnia.
She confessed in the tearful clip, "I'm so tired of not sleeping... Like it's been a month of not sleeping."
The former athlete further cited the fact that she "went to a ton of doctors," but claimed to have "only just begun to get to the root cause of this health spiral crisis."
Maroney claimed that she had finally discovered that she suffers from histamine intolerance, which happens when the body has high quantities of the chemical histamine.
When did McKayla Maroney find out about histamine intolerance?
Maroney said she only recently realized her health problems were related to her high histamine levels and claimed that a "massive adrenaline problem" was caused by her histamine allergy.
She exclaimed, "When it got really bad, high histamine foods made me feel internally itchy, like I was getting bit by mosquitoes all night."
Since then, she has stopped eating foods high in histamine and has begun taking a DAO supplement to aid with her insomnia.
Maroney mentioned that she also has anemia and has lately learned that eating foods high in oxalate, such as spinach, almonds, and potatoes, makes her "massively exhausted" and causes "weird neuropathy issues," which have a detrimental impact on her sleep.
At the end of her piece, she confessed, "I still feel kind of embarrassed about all my wacko health issues and food sensitivities."
What is histamine intolerance?
The chemical histamine is released by the human immune system, which is mostly known for its part in triggering allergy symptoms. However, it also performs other crucial tasks like controlling cognitive ability and the sleep-wake cycle.
According to Healthline, high histamine levels indicate histamine intolerance where the body is unable to break down histamine. The most typical symptoms are gastrointestinal, though it can impact a variety of bodily systems.
Histamine intolerance is a sign that one has grown an overabundance of it rather than a sensitivity to it.
Diamine oxidase (DAO), an enzyme that breaks down histamine in the body, is thought to be deficient in those with histamine intolerance.
Among the symptoms it can produce are gastrointestinal problems, itchy skin, headaches, lethargy, and sleeplessness.
