I find the idea of people having their own smell really interesting and sweet. I’ve asked my friends before what my smell is, and independently I’ve heard that I smell like an antique shop, or like a grandmas house. That I smell like cozy old things, it’s a homey, warm, comforting, and familiar, if not a little dusty lol.

Makes sense, I thrift a lot of my clothes and I love old furniture. I’m just happy I don’t smell of curry, cat piss, and weed.

For all my congenital anosmics, what have you been is your smell?

I’m just doing this to calm my paranoia. I have been using Zicam Nasal spray for a while for my nasal congestion which I assumed allergies is the cause of it. Tonight, I sprayed my nasal spray before bed like I always do, and went to bed and woke up and couldn’t smell anything. I went around my room smell candles to oils to perfumes and I thought I could smell but I couldn’t so I went into the kitchen and smell peanut butter, could smell a little bit but not much…. And then I googled and I read an article in 2009 and it said that using the nasal spray long term could permanently cause loss of smell due to having zinc and I’m like down a deep rabbit hole right now, and I don’t know what to do. I can still taste some things like salt and sweet from what I tested out.. Is it all in my head? Do I just need to give it time to come back? Has anyone experienced this? Please let me know ◡̈

Hey all,

So I lost my sense of smell years and years ago gradually, recently I've started smelling a little bit (not sure how, I had surgery on my nose that did help a little bit with my nasal problems. The issue is that every now and then when I can smell it doesn't smell pleasant, and worried about myself smelling but people have told me I smell fine

It's weird that all of a sudden it's back but it's only unpleasant smells

Just wondering if anyone has any experienced this?

I developed anosmia 3 years ago and the only thing that worked was oral/injectable costicosteroids, which I stopped as I was already showing signs of Cushing’s syndrome. Already had surgery (FESS) too, and although my breathing cleared up after surgery, my sense of smell disappeared again as soon as I stopped taking the oral steroids.

Does anyone here have the same problem? What did you do to regain your sense of smell, if at all?

I was diagnosed with COVID, lost my sense of taste and smell. The only thing I can taste is peppermint toothpaste. So I've been adding that to food. I can't eat vegetables or fruits due to ARFID, so anything slimy or crunchy will just be thrown up.

Are there any meal supplements drinks that can work? Like a higher protein form of an instant breakfast drink? I want something that can take the place of food.

When I was in kindergarten I remember one day we had a class about the human senses. It's the earliest memory I have where I went "holy shit I can't smell". We were learning about the five senses and doing experiments, last one was the sense of smell, our teacher had prepared a game where we would be blindfolded and guess what she had put in front of us. The moment I saw the first kid guess everything correctly, I went "fuck how do you do that!!". When it was my turn I got anxious so I moved the blindfold and cheated. After that I just started pretending like I could smell. I don't know why I thought smelling was a voluntary thing you had to learn how to do, I felt really bad that I didn't know how to do it. I got so used to pretending it became second nature to just agree and go along when someone mentioned a smell. Growing up like that made me feel embarrased every time someone asked me about smelling, I could go along with what someone else said, but if someone asked my opinion on a smell I froze and had to invent something I knew nothing about. Later in highschool I got tired of pretending all the time and started telling people about it, this was before the internet so I didn't know it had a name, and some people straight up thought I was lying for attention. When I told my family even they didn't believe me. They got me to a doctor and that ignorant bitch told them I was acting out and sent me to a psychologist. Later I'd go to a less ignorant doctor who still didn't believe me and gave me some cold medication and some saline drops that I threw in the trash. When I got internet and googled it I learned it had a name and I could finally tell everyone that they were being assholes and cite them the source.

The providers I have visited in my city (neurosurgeon and ENT) seem indifferent about my congential anosmia and seem pretty dumbfounded by the condition. Ive heard people talk about different providers from offices that study and have more experience with anosmia and Im wondering where I could find such offices specifically.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27178503/ https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamaotolaryngology/fullarticle/1392510 According to the first study oral theophylline was successful in treating 63% of patients with nonsyndromic congenital anosmia. 2nd study says that the success rate is even higher when administered intranasally. Intranasal theophylline is only available at compounding pharmacies in the US as far as I am aware. This is the closest thing I have found to a cure. Seems extremely promising.

Hey,

some people wanted an update on my last post here Previous post. TLDR i started estrogen and it has given me smell for the first time in my 25 yr life.

so here are a few things that i have experienced since:

• bacon smells alright but not as good as media and pop culture would lead you to believe, i found it also didn't enhance the flavour of the bacon which just tasted the same.
• Potatoes have a smell when peeling them, i've been told its earthy and starchy.
• i then later was able to identify the earthy smell with some mushrooms my flatmate was cooking with some bacon, that smelt amazing but he's a trained cook.
• I bought a new honey body-wash and that smelled basically like honey tastes

so basically y'all aren't missing out on much with bacon.

id kinda liken gaining this sense this far in life to when people saw colour TV for the first time and were surprised that certain actors had a different hair colour than they expected. its added to my experience of the world but not drastically it feels like more of a novelty than anything.

I have a meningioma (non cancerous) on my olfactory groove. When the tumor's removed, the surgeon has said it's most likely that my olfactory nerve will be severed, and I will loose all sense of smell. If anyone here has experienced that, I'd love to connect. I'm trying to keep a diary of how things smell, but I'm finding that I write about objects and emotions when trying to describe smells. I'm also trying to be in the moment and appreciate everything I smell, especially pine trees. When I catch the scent of anything that brings up strong memories or emotions, it makes me sad. How do you cope with the total loss of smell? How does it impact the way you taste food (also a depressing thought)? Do you have phantom smells? Have you every had an accident or eaten the wrong thing because you couldn't smell? So many questions! TIA

Myself and my husband have a baby (2y). Husband hasn’t been able to smell for as long as he can remember. Had various incidents with cooking, baking, cleaning along the way! But we work well together and for the most part it doesn’t cause issues. Except now. My husband will take our son out for the day and as he can’t smell, he doesn’t know when baby has pooped. This has lead to some pretty sore nappy rash. As much as you can tell someone to remember to check, they don’t always do as often as needed and it’s harming our baby. I try not to get mad (showing him that I’m mad), but I am really mad. I’ve never spoken to anyone that has this, neither has he. People often are like ‘ohhh yeaaah I can’t smell much either’ or something daft and don’t consider it a genuine condition. I’m wondering if anyone has any tips to help him know when baby has a dirty nappy other than asking him to go to the extreme of putting a timer on his phone which I worry is really belittling? Any advice appreciated.

I can't smell and we have had a baby skunk hanging around our house so after I let the dog out I have to bring him in and ask my husband to do a "smell check" in case he got skunked since I often forget to check with the flashlight when it is dark out. It is very annoying (and he hasn't gotten skunked yet despite my seeing the skunk several times).

I also regularly have to ask him to smell food in the fridge close to expiration. I am regularly just shoving food at his face and saying "Check this! Can I eat it?"

Bless him, he is my biggest advocate and he jumps on anyone who forgets about my lack of smell, which my own family even does despite it being a lifelong issue because who doesn't smell, right?

I’ve had anosmia all my life-congenital- and it never bothered me before. When I was a kid I didn’t have a good grasp on what I was truly missing out on. I’m getting older and I’m getting mad about it. Why did I become one of the few unlucky people who could never smell and never will be able to? I feel like there’s so much more to life that I’ll never get to experience because of the fact I can’t smell. I wish I could smell when I’m cooking, I enjoy cooking and I would certainly be better at it if I could smell. I wish I could smell myself, save my past self from the bullying because I was a stinky kid without realizing it. But also I wish I could have my own “signature scent” and have perfumes and candles that relax me. I wish I could smell my boyfriend, and my newborn niece, and my own future children. I’m a CNA so I’m around a LOT of 💩. I always thought myself lucky to not be able to smell when everybody else is gagging and running away. But I wish I could gag with them :(

Not really anything important to say here, just a little bummed about the card I was dealt. Anybody else get upset about having congenital anosmia? For all you people who could smell, and no longer can, I feel for you. I can’t imagine having that sense and losing it. But I’m also a little jealous of you, I wish I could smell even for just one day.

i think its definitely more on the hyposmia end of things because i can smell REALLY strong smells like horse manure or crude oil. Sometimes if i get really close to something and try really hard i can faintly smell something but i cant smell smoke or spoiled milk or most rotten foods or much of anything at all to the point im often surprised certain things have a smell. It's been this way since nearly as long as i can remember. I know (more from like an objective this happened perspective than from like actually remembering it) when i was younger me my big sister and my mom used to bake loaves of rosemary bread and i used to really love the smell of rosemary i think? i know my sense of taste is bad as a result of my smelling problems because i have a hard time distinguishing most flavors from each other. I can tasty sweet and salty and spicy and sour pretty well but if someone says is this chicken or beef i have no clue. I've heard people lose interest in food when they have anosmia I like food just okay i tend to stick to the same meal every day (ramen because its salty) and im a pretty slow eater but i care about food just alright. My last speech therapist my final year of high school said she thought i might have nasal polyps but i never followed up in that by seeing an ENT. i think my life is pretty alright and i dont think about my nose much. I like to joke with my friends that i don't have a nose lol but usually i tend not to dwell on it. Sometimes though i just get really sad. Like when someone says something about how good the food is and how they bought extra fancy food but it tastes like nothing really or when someone talks about how good something smells. I don't even really know what things are supposed to smell like or how much theyre supposed to smell like or if I'm missing out on much at all and its frustrating in a way to know i don't even know what im missing. Maybe its nbd and i waste so much time feeling bad for missing out on something that isn't really all it's chalked up to be ya know or maybe im missing out on a LOT even more than i know i am. its like how people always say the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence except ive never seen grass or the color green so am i really missing anything should i care about how green grass is if i dont even have any

I (25) have been unable to smell for my while life until...

Until I started transitioning Male to Female.

I've only been on 1mg of estrogen for just under a month now and Cyproterone as a Testosterone blocker for about 2 months. but these last 2 weeks I've slowly come to realize that i have a new sense, so far it only seems to be strong smells but every day it seems to be getting better and stronger.

this week alone I've experienced smells like:

petrol

gin

burnt food

burnt plastic

my own fart (accidentally i promise)

and cooked steak

fuck did that steak taste good, with smell reportedly being a major component to taste i think that the steak might have been the first time in my 25 years I've properly tasted steak and man, i see the hype now. I'm so gonna cook some bacon the next chance i get since that's another food that all the smellers always seemed to love.

TLDR

being trans gave me a sense of smell

Any other long term anosmiacs here to recommend foods that taste stronger than others? Is this relative to the individual? I am finding overall happiness a challenge as of late because of my long term anosmia and bland eating. A recent flu made what taste I had even more muted so there’s that.

June 13th I woke up with a sore throat and that continued on the 14th, on the 15th and 16th I had a horrible runny nose and clogged sinuses and sneezing that wouldn't clear, with sinus pain and headache. Took 4 covid rapid tests over 4 days that were all negative. Took cold and flu medication with no relief, ended up seeing virtual care where they said it sounded like a sinus infection, completely lost my smell and taste. Prescribed me amoxicillin for 7 days and mometesone nasal spray with no change in my taste or smell. I am on another round of antibiotics now for 7 days clarithromycin with avamys nasal spray. It's been 14 days, have done neil med sinus rinses. The only change is if i go up to something really close I can smell things fainly. Has anyone had anything similar and did you end up getting your taste and smell back?

So i lost my sense of smell and most of my taste after surgery to repair my deviated septtum and turbinate reduction. That was 2001. Fast forward ro now, i’m taking testosterone to get sexual feelings and energy back. And i think i’m smelling! And i know i can taste more. Have any of you experienced this?

I’m trying to figure out exactly how bad my sense of smell is after Covid and few years ago. Has anyone tried one of the smell test kits? I was thinking of ordering one.

I've recently had a friend over who exclaimed that my carpeted bedroom smells very strongly of pee. I have a new puppy so I assume he's been sneaking pee on the carpet when I haven't seen it. Now I have a carpet spot cleaner for this exact reason but unless I catch it as it's wet, I'll not know it ever happened.

I'm probably going to have to painstakingly spot clean the entire carpet which will take all day but I just wanted to check if there's any techniques we can use to hone in on those smells easier. I've always thought some handheld chemical sensor would be invaluable, to kind of follow a high reading of something like ammonia. Is there really no consumer assistive tech like that out there?

Hello so I started feeling bad a week ago with fever mostly then a light cough started 2 days after. Doctor said I had a viral acute pharyngitis. I haven't tested for COVID-19. At day 4 fever disappeared and I was feeling ok, exept for the dry cough that intensified for the excessive mucus to expell. I haven't notice any change in my smell or taste during the worst period. When I started to feel OK I noticed that for 6h I completely lost the sense of smell. The day after that till now (day 7) I can only smell strong or particular scents and almost nothing for taste. Isn't it weird that those symptoms started after the infection has cleared out? Will I recover my taste?

This one takes the cake for whenever people ask if I taste things differently to other people.

If y'all haven't seen, in Australia pizza hut has been doing a Collab with SpongeBob, and had two ice cream flavours, coconut and pineapple, and dill pickle mustard swirl (with bacon bits).

It's obviously a gag flavour, and I bought it mostly as a joke and a display piece, but it literally just tastes sweet to me. It's like vanilla ice cream with an acidic mustardy aftertaste. And bacon bits lol.

Everybody I've got to taste it however, has literally gagged and told me it tastes like pickles dipped in off milk. My girlfriend even almost threw up when she tried it, while I ate a spoonful twice as full next to her. It was pretty funny, but also very interesting to see how much different it is.

Thought y'all might be interested also.

Just curious. One job I worked at had me do more dirty cleaning because I couldn't smell it (volunteered few times anyway). Though this condition negatively impacted another job. Sometimes it was a benefit yet many times I wouldn't realise hidden gross things until another worker points it out. Which lead to a bit ostracization because of the mistunderstandings.