Only caveat I’ll say is the potential danger such as there was a gas leak at my old apartment and I didn’t realize until a friend had come over and smelt it.
I was born not being able to smell. Potentially due to autoimmune or not fully developed frontal lobe. Every specialist I’ve seen has a different theory.
A few years ago I did a nasal spray to open the tubes in my nose. Within a few weeks I was driving and realized I was smelling something for the first time.
I rolled down the window and in an instant of inhaling I felt like I had swallowed a turd. I was smelling a manure truck up the road.
Like with any sense if you’ve never had it and then do, it’s so much stronger.
Bathrooms smelled at work, I hated filling up my car with gas, the fumes from traffic were awful, the basement smelled of litter boxes. I was a smoker and had never smelt one before - I couldn’t have one without gagging (which is a good thing lol)
I understand I’m missing out on memory senses or being able to cook differently (I love to cook and I do cook great food, just without smell) But even without that it’s not worth it for all the bad smells to me.
TL;DR I was born without the sense of smell. Through nasal spray was able to and it was awful. I prefer not being able to smell.
My parosmia is at its worst point yet. Also, I can’t smell/taste a lot of things at all. Can’t smell bleach or flowers - nothing. Most of the foods that don’t affect my parosmia have little-to-no taste. Is this the case with you?
I have never been able to smell, ever. When I was young, before I can even remember, I would tell my parents I couldn’t smell things, and for a few years, they didn’t believe me. They figured I just didn’t understand smells yet, and disregarded it (I don’t think they had ever encountered an anosmic before). Finally they realized I wasn’t lying, and we chalked it up as an anomaly. I lived that way for many years, until I was 15, and had a very traumatic life experience. This resulted in depression, anxiety, etc, and one day I just needed to leave school for what I was feeling (probably a panic attack), and at this point, I was set up with a PA, and everything changed. Somehow amongst our introductory conversation about my various medical conditions, my lack of smell came up. He immediately ordered bloodwork and then upon the results, referred me to an endocrinologist. After a few appointments and more tests, it was determined that I had hypogonadism. Which, by my understanding, is a disconnect in the pituitary gland that inhibits the ability of the brain to send signals through the body to produce testosterone. I was always a slow developer, but had I not undergone these tests, I would have never fully matured. Anosmia, in turn, spotlighted the fact that I needed testosterone therapy, and without it, I’d be 27 today, with the physical maturity of probably a 16 year old. For anyone out there reading this, whether it’s an anosmic, friend of an anosmic, parent of an anosmic, etc, I encourage you/them to inquire more. It seems like a silly thing, not being able to smell, but there are a lot of things that come with it. And sometimes, it could be the ticket to fixing a bigger issue.
I can't sense the smell of anything apart for very, VERY strong products like isopropyl alcohol . AMA (Sorry for bad English)
Hi everyone,
I contracted COVID about 6 months ago and since then my sense of smell is still heavily impaired. It is progressively getting better, but progress is incredibly slow and incremental. I now fortunately would have the opportunity to get vaccinated with the Biontech shot, however, I am wondering if it may cause another loss of smell due to another, second immune reaction.
Is there anyone with COVID-related anosmia who got vaccinated and can report about his or her experience? I am absolutely not sceptical towards vaccinations in any way, I just never ever want to endure another anosmia or loss of smell for months - I just can't take it psychologically since it takes such a heavy toll on one's mental health. But I guess that's the same for all of you here on this sub.
Thanks in advance to everyone and all the best to you!
EDIT: thanks for bringing to my attention that this sub is primarily for people who are born with anosmia or have it permanently. It was insensitive of me and this is not the correct place to ask these type of questions. Thanks anyway to all of you and all the best. I hope science may have solutions in the future, who knows.
I realized I couldn't smell when I was probably 6 or 7 and everything my mom cooked smelled like "air." I can still taste but I'm sure it's blunted. I don't think my parents ever really believed it until recently. (I'll be 34 in June.) My mom took me to the pediatrician when I was probably 10 or 11 but he just told me to blow my nose. After that I never took it any farther and it honestly never bothered me through school and I never gave it a second thought. Sure people knew but the only time it came up was in the football and wrestling locker rooms when I got the ol' damn you're so lucky you can't smell right now lol. After high school I joined the Marines and I lied about the smell thing to get in. Had some close friends that would make jokes about it but it was never a thing and it never bothered me.
The only reason I researched this and learned the word anosmia is because of my wife. When we were first dating and she found out about it she would have me close my eyes and give my Starburst or skittles and have me guess the flavors. (Spoiler I never got one right). Since then anytime flavor or taste comes up she dismisses anything I have to say since she thinks because I can't smell it means I can't taste anything at all, and I guess thats when it became a "thing." This was the first time I was EVER in my life self conscious about not being able to smell. And to be honest on a scale of 1-10 it's probably about a 2 as far as how much I care, but she makes such a big deal out of it that it bothers me a little. So at 30ish years old I finally researched what it was and it still didn't matter to me. And now a few years after that, being new to reddit and finding this anosmia thread (tonight), in the covid era, and after more than a few drinks, I'd thought I'd share my thoughts lol. While I can't empathize with people that had smell and then lost it, I feel like I can understand going from zero to one hundred, because it truly never mattered to me until recently. Sorry for the long post.
This is your regular reminder (and plea) from me to use iGive when you shop online. And set your cause to Monell Chemical Senses Center.
Monell does so much research, training of multidisciplinary professionals, and public outreach and eduction about olfaction and particularly anosmia. It is a wonderful and important private institute that depends greatly on private donations.
Monell's work is especially important right now, as COVID has affected so many people's sense of smell and taste. Much of the early information about symptoms and treatment options that has been available to both medical professionals and the public came from Monell's interdisciplinary teams.
I make a recurring donation every month, because this is a charity that is dear to me personally, and other special donations throughout the year, as well as remembering Monell in my estate planning. But there are things that everyone can do easily that don't cost you any money!
I would so love to see this sub get behind supporting anosmia research. A lot of people doing little things like this can make a big difference (you can also support Monell through Amazon Smile if you use Amazon).
And you can do it just by shopping! When you sign up at iGive and choose Monell Chemical Senses as your charity, then add the Chrome Extension to your browser, it automatically tells you every time you are shopping at a store where your purchases can earn money for Monell. These are some of the stores where your purchases can support anosmia research -- at no cost to you!
- Fragrancenet
- FragranceX
- Ulta
- Sephora
- Neiman Marcus
- Macy's
- Lancome
- Molton Brown
- Walgreens
- CVS
- Harvey Nichols
Honestly most of the places that I shop, and a lot of the places where I do other business just pop up automatically. Like this year doing my taxes online resulted in a donation. Paying my cell phone bill. Buying pet food. There are a lot of subscription services on there too, way too many things to list. It's so easy with the Chrome Extension, you don't even have to think about it.
Were your taste and smell already altered even a little bit? For me it was only a few things and not very strong difference but definitely noticeable. (orange juice, lemon, meats,...)
A new article and its full text preprint indicates that long term covid anosmia may indicate the continued presence of covid replicating in nasal cavities (often not detected by conventional nasal PCR swab)... Potential for infection of several types of cells is demonstrated (not just the subtentacular support cells, also neural infection). Brain infection detected in hamsters. More details in the enclosed article links, below...
Article
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/351294436_COVID-19-related_anosmia_is_associated_with_viral_persistence_and_inflammation_in_human_olfactory_epithelium_and_brain_infection_in_hamsters
Preprint with full text
https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.11.18.388819v1
I have YSL La nuit de l'homme EDT... I spray 2 on my same wrist just at night for personal smelling...
I can literally only smell it if my nose is at most 2 inches away from my wrist... there is no way anyone around me would be able to smell this unless I used like 4 sprays and worked in close proximity with people.... maybe 3 sprays and cuddling on a date... and mind you this is freshly sprayed.
The only scent I have that I can actually smell on me, like properly, is Polo Blue by Ralph Lauren and that is probably the strongest in my collection of 7 scents.
Are colognes supposed to be like this, are they meant for personal / intimate situations... or am I really just anosmic and people further away can smell it...
If I can't smell this YSL on my own arm when its resting on my chest laying down... how can someone sitting next to me in class or on the bus or something smell it.
For context, I've never been able to smell as far as I can tell but my sense of taste seems fine. I was seeing a doctor today about a quick, unrelated matter but I ended up asking about it and what the next steps would be to find out why I don't have a sense of smell. He examined my nose and told me that my nasal passage was really irritated and inflamed, so he thought that I might have an unknown allergy (Which might account for how much I sneeze as well). Has anyone else had any experiences with allergies being a potential cause of their anosmia?
I noticed in reading a lot of entries on here that a lot of people had anosmia recovered immediately into Parosmia.
When I got COVID (November 15th, likely infected on the 13th), I had anosmia starting the 17th which began recovering to normal senses by November 22nd (just in time to taste half of thanksgiving). I was pretty much back to 90% taste and smell by early December, where the last 10% I attributed to my previous history as a super sniffer / taster. It seemed like from December 7th to January 31st I was pretty much normal. Parosmia cranked in starting Feb 4th and I’ve been losing more and more foods since.
Anyone else go from COVID to normal to parosmatic?
Like many newcomers here I’m dealing with this as a result of covid. I have questions for those who are going through similar
I’m 1 month out and my smell has been coming back since the first week of symptoms but with parosmia as well.
But i’ve noticed some smells still don’t register at all. My body odor/musk is very weak and distorted but noticeably weak. Can’t smell my own gas either which I guess isn’t the worst thing but still
Also cannot smell things like water/moisture which usually has a noticeable musk to it as well
Can’t smell my own breath
The things I smell train with like abscent I can smell well
These are the most noticeable. Food is of course very weak as well, but it was getting stronger but I’ve felt a big setback this week. Got dose 2 pfizer this week but I don’t know that that is linked in anyway
Anyway, wondering if anyone’s been on this track and if it’s gotten better over the months. Just looking for some insight or hope to get through this.
I’ve also had a weird bug spray and metal type taste on my tongue starting this past week as well. That is when I noticed a marked decline in my smell progress and now taste which was mostly ok when my smell stopped
I’m happy to be able to smell some things and I’m trying not to get too neurotic about it because it’s only been a little over a month but you hear 2 weeks from everyone and it’s been a rather rough road so far and certainly not a full recovery at any point.
So, on March 23, 2021. just woken up and I can't smell or taste anything. So I thought I got COVID or something but I did not experience any COVID symptoms. So I drink lemon with hot water, ginger, calamansi. It doesn't work.
As of today, when I eat sometimes I taste the food sour or sweet but I can't smell it. Then later I can't taste it again. So, it is about 1 month already that I don't smell and taste foods.
Hello everyone. I am a grad student conducting research to find design solution(s) for those experiencing smell loss. I am looking into designing a product to help those with anosmia better deal with their surroundings. I am trying to contact as many individuals as possible who have anosmia (congenital/acquired ; full/partial/recovering) to fill out my questionnaire. Here is the link:
Smell Loss Survey & Questionnaire (google.com)
Thank you for help!
Edit: After I was alerted to problems with my questionnaire, it has been corrected.
Okay this is for all you Cosgenital Anosimiacs like me and for anyone who HAD a sense of smell but no longer does. What kind of alcohol taste the best to you?? I tried alcohol for the first time this past Sunday and it was not great. I had some bubbly pink moscato and a black cherry white claw. Both had a super weird feeling in my mouth and had no taste.
Do those drinks not have a taste (Taste being what you get from your taste buds: sweet, salty, savory, bitter, and sour) and just have a flavor (comes from your sense of smell which I obviously don't have). And to the people who could smell and taste before and have possible tried them since you lost your senses, do they taste differently?
Hola. En diciembre pasado tuve Covid, afortunadamente fue un caso no tan grave, y entre las muchas secuelas que me quedaron es la anosmia (no huelo pues). Desde ese momento he recuperado poco a poco la capacidad de oler, pero he notado que los olores normales ya no son los mismos. Por ejemplo los huevos me huelen como a podrido, pero al comerlos el sabor es el mismo de siempre, y así con varias cosas como perfumes o jabones, donde el olor es un tanto desagradable, y en el caso de perfumes solo captó el olor del alcohol y no de la esencia en si. Alguien tiene una experiencia similar? Supongo que es pasajero pero quisiera leer sus experiencias.
Watch dr Eric berg on YouTube Talk about this subject. I followed his advice and have 90% recovered. He says take vitamin d, vitamin c, and zinc. I did salmon for vit D, took a whole food vit c supplement, multivitamin and pumpkin seeds for zinc! And B1 in the form of benfrotiamine
Do you guys ever feel like your memory of your childhood is very vague? I feel like my friends have much more vivid memories and they remember a lot more than me. I know that smell can trigger long term memories.
Hi all! This is my first time posting in this subreddit, so I apologize if my formatting is incorrect or if this is the wrong place to ask this. If I'm doing anything wrong, please let me know and I will correct it.
For as long as I can remember, I haven't had a sense of smell. When I was a kid I tried to tell my family about it, but my mom freaked out and my siblings didn't believe me. So from a young age I decided to just act like I could smell.
Fast forward to now. I'm in college, living on my own, and I've worked hard to accept my anosmia and find ways to live with it. It can feel extremely isolating, and to this day my family still does not know. I recently opened up to my boyfriend of 5 years about it, and he was so accepting and calm about it that I was inspired to try to talk to my family about it again. I'm building up the courage to talk to them about it, but now that I am an adult and have had time to research it and come to terms with it, I think I am in a better place to talk to my loved ones about it.
COVID-19 has also opened up conversations about anosmia, which I hope leads to deeper research and discoveries on the topic. My anosmia still makes me sad, especially at times when I think about how I'll never be able to smell my newborns or know what flowers smell like. But the fact of the matter is that I have so many other things in my life to be grateful for, that I just have to accept my anosmia and continue on.
This brings me to the reason why I am finally reaching out to this community, after a long time of building up the courage to do so! The field I am studying for school is product design, and the projects I am most passionate about are the ones that improve people's quality of life.
I am considering making anosmia my senior capstone subject, not only because I have it, but because I want to see if there are ways I can improve our quality of life, even in small ways. For example, I'm always worried that my clothes might smell even if they were just washed, or that food in Tupperware in my fridge has gone bad, or a million other little things that could create a weird smell that we simply would not know about.
This is my longwinded way of asking, have you had a specific experience with your anosmia that really stands out to you? Are there specific tasks you avoid doing because of your anosmia? These are questions I can answer myself, but because I am studying to become a product designer, I can't run off to design stuff solel
... keep reading on reddit ➡https://old.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/kfuljs/til_ben_jerrys_ice_cream_was_invented_because_ben/
Hello, I recently got on promesodine for a sinus infection. For over year I have not been able to smell anything, except rubbing alcohol. My dr thought I lost it due to some type of sinus infection ( I have bad allergies 🤧). Well I have been promesodine and for the past 3 days I have been able to smell for short amounts of time.. it’s WONDERFUL... but then it goes away and I am sad :( has anyone experienced this before on medication or just in general?
I woke up today not being able to smell or taste much of anything. Does anybody have any tips for “smell training” in order to prevent long lasting loss of smell? I am nervous
My mom did an MRI and they found that she has pansinusitis which caused Anosmia, she tried many medications and the only medication that worked is Diprostene (injection). Is there a cure or an alternative to Diprostene (she only can take it twice a year) ?
It seems my nose is always running now.
I’m two years in.
I’m constantly afraid that something is burning and I don’t smell it. Like when I’m driving and the engine overheats. Or my phone charger burnt and melted to my carpet. Or the oven was left on and I forgot my food. I’m just always scared that something is on fire and I can’t tell.
Also I’m constantly afraid that I smell bad!
I’m also always scared I’m breathing in chemicals (like the smell of paint or strong cleaning supplies) that other people always comment on.
Any tips?
(P.s I obviously have never had a sense of smell so I don’t really understand it fully so I know I may be putting too much weight on it with my fear of burning things)
Good evening to you all,
this is a question more for the genuine anosmians as opposed to the covid ones (welcome to our world btw).
I only recently discovered my lack of smell was a known disease. I grew up thinking it was normal, or moreso, i thought i was stupid.... that my lack of smell was my brain not understanding my nose. Like how i know some people cant understand computers or how there are some things for the life of me i dont get. This was because i could sense petrol/gasoline in my nose and eucalyptus oil. My eye opening moment was learning those arent smell.
Stupid in itself i know, but call it lack of self confidence.
Every now and then i get what i think is a whiff of something, but i cant reproduce it or know its happening. maybe I daydreamt it...I just dont know.
i also had the added cruelty of my mother telling me it was in the family because my grandmother has it...only to tell me decades later she meant 'When she gets a cold' after I questioned why she has an extensive perfume collection.
But my question is why does this happen?
How are congenital anosmiacs created?
I think im otherwise normal. im pretty sure I can taste because i love food .... but then again am i attracted to the texture? the saltiness and sweetness? the mental association?
For example i cant tell between say ...coke and bourbon vs coke and rum.
I know as a 4 year old i had some concussions which might be a reason, but what are other reasons why i can be otherwise normal but just not smell?
I went to an ENT spexialist who did some tests and said my nose and that was normal. I dont think he took mer seriously but he did refer to an MRI. which i couldnt follow up on.
Why does this happen?
https://preview.redd.it/6l96qscd00k61.jpg?width=2000&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=247e665c23eaa667dfc67b480921ca39c6cf0f14
My anosmia is congenital from having Kallmann syndrome.
Anosmia is getting a greater awareness due to the COVID pandemic.
I think my anosmia affects my daily life more than I realise but I often forget I can not smell and it is other people who remind me.
There are common things that most people with anosmia have probably experienced at some stage like eating / drinking spoiled food or leaving the oven on too long when cooking.
However the sense of smell is also associated with physical attraction, social interaction and memories which go totally un-noticed.
Hi there! I'm actually 27F, but posting on behalf of my boyfriend 29M (vitals below).
Boyfriend had COVID and was symptomatic beginning December 8th, 2020. He has not been able to smell since then, although he's been practicing smell training with various essential oils and coffee grounds almost daily. He can *occasionally* get very faint whiffs of coffee, lavender, and rose essential oil, but that's pretty much it.
He has terrible insurance and paid hundreds of dollars out of pocket to see an ENT this week who essentially shrugged and said "that sucks; all my patients are experiencing this and idk what to do, try this nasal steroid fluticasone proprionate". A cursory investigation into said steroid shows that it's essentially used for allergies, and can *maybe possibly potentially* improve olfactory issues based on some study I read, which only had a sample size of n=192.
Here are my questions:
- Is there any harm in trying out this steroid, which is literally just Flonase, for an extended period? I know some steroids can compromise the immune system. My experience with Prednisone in 2010 ended up putting me, an otherwise healthy 17 year old, in ICU with end-term septic shock. We definitely don't wanna go there.
- If this were to work, would it work completely? Might it be possible for him to regain olfactory functioning in full someday after four months (so far) of it being absent?
- Is smell training effective?
- Does anyone have an idea of what his prognosis might be, being that it's been four months now that he cannot smell anything? I know that these are very tough questions to answer, because there's so much we still don't know about COVID's long term effects, but we would really just appreciate ANY insight or direction that could help him.
- Is there anything else we can do that we haven't yet tried or considered?
Boyfriend's vitals are as follows:
29, cis male, caucasian, 6'0", unsure of weight but he's very healthy and physically fit...lean and muscular. Does not smoke, drinks rarely (glass of wine here and there). Very infrequent marijuana use via vape.
Thank you SO, so so much in advance for any help and insight.
This is so silly, but my panic attacks are driving me up the walls.
My mother in law infected my girlfriend and she infected me. They got sick at the exact same time with a, what I've seen from asking around, normal progression: day one they got a bad fever, day 2 they were fine, and day 3 they started getting anosmia, and that's the only symptom they've had the past 3 days.
I got sick I calculate 2 days after my girlfriend, with only a mild 38.5C for the first 2 days and the 2 days after that I've been fever free, no anosmia, no other symptoms but a dry nose and throat that started yesterday (no cough)
But everywhere I read, it says that anosmia is linked to mild cases, and whenever I ask my medic friends about it, they say the same thing, that they've never seen a severe patient with anosmia.
The thing is, they also say they've never heard of a case like mine, other than from old people that have had complications (I'm 33M for reference), and none of my friends that have been sick, got it in any way like I have, it was either the worst flu ever and anosmia, or just anosmia.
I'm so scared that I'm then a severe case in waiting. The only way I "manage" my anxiety is using CBD drops, which I stopped using once infected because of a study I read about it being great when things get tough, but maybe bad at the beginning, which causes more anxiety, which makes me worry my immune system is going to be affected, which causes more anxiety, and so on and so forth
I'd really like some stories about people with similar progressions to mine and how'd it go. I'm so scared of being hospitalized as the country I'm living in is not managing that well and now I don't know what's COVID and what's the panic talking.
TL;DR I'm scared that the reason that I (33M) haven't gotten anosmia is because I'm a severe case in waiting. I'd like to hear from people that had fever for only a couple days as the only symptom and how they fared. Tips about managing quite bad anxiety are also very appreciated.
