Imagine what it would be like if you couldn't smell some of your favorite aromas (flowers, lemons, coffee, baking bread) or foul odors (toxic chemicals, vomit, garbage, smoke). Now imagine that your favorite aromas smell like those foul odors and food tastes like the foul odors. There's no escaping it. Cooking, cleaning, eating, bathing, driving, shopping, working, playing, socializing... You can sense it whether you breath through your nose or your mouth. The average, healthy person doesn't realize how much the sense of smell affects every aspect of their life.
Cleaning products:
Laundry detergent, fabric softener, dish soap or anything "lemony fresh" smell disgusting to me (like rancid, rotten citrus). Note: Fragrance free products are not better.
Personal products:
Any type of soap. (Hand soap, hand sanitizer, body wash, shampoo, conditioner, lotion.) Deodorant and make up are also badly scented. Again, fragrance free products are not any better.
Mint toothpaste smell and taste bad. That bad minty smell lingers in the bathroom after someone else just finished brushing their teeth. Also, I can't get near that person's "minty fresh breath". I never realized before but it is difficult to find dental products with added sensitivity protection in flavors other than mint.
Cooking:
Most cooked meats smell rotten during any cooking process. Whether it's a good grilled steak or burger, a roast in the crock pot, a turkey in the oven or bacon in a frying pan, the strong, distorted smells are overwhelming. The odor will linger in the air for hours or longer.
Work or play:
I'll call it the smells of creativity. Paints (of any type), markers, crayons... Then there's play doh, I'm sure you know that smell. And this one lingers on your hands after multiple washings.
Outside the house:
The air outside, nature, has some indistinguishably bad smell that I never noticed before parosmia. Car exhaust and gasoline are sickening. The smells from restaurants and grocery stores are overwhelming with an array of nauseating smells. The office lunch room smells like something burning and/or bad coffee.
Dangerous odors I can't detect:
I could always smell a natural gas leak in the past. Now, I'm surprised when someone tells me they smell gas in a room and run to open a window. Smoke, fire, something burning. My toast is often burnt unless I keep a constant watch on it. Spoiled food. How am I supposed to know if food is really spoiled when it smells bad all the time? The refrigerator broke and I couldn't smell the rancid odor emanating from it.
Bizarre backwards smells:
I live in a bizarro world where the "poop" doesn't stink but the clean laundry does. Body odor doesn't smell but deodorant stinks? Normal bad smells are odorless (body odor, bathroom odors, cat litter box, poop). Normal good smells are offending. Fresh laundry always smells dirty to me and dirty laundry has no scent. Just like minty fresh breath, I can't be near someone wearing fresh, clean clothes. How can I not smell some odors and other smells are so disgusting? Crazy, right?
Nostalgic memory smells are gone:
So many happy memories are brought to mind from old familiar smells. It's hard to bring back those good memories of grandma's homemade apple pie when I can't detect the sweet aroma of a pie baking in the oven. Christmas doesn't seem the same without the scent of pine trees, cinnamon and Christmas cookies in the air.
I miss the smells that remind me of my childhood and scents that remind me of family members who have passed away. The old familiar scent of my dad's cologne that reminded me of him, all gone.
Good smells that I miss:
I miss the smell of pumpkin spice candles in the fall which always gave me a cozy, comforting feeling. Now it's like, what's the point.
I always loved the aroma of fresh brewing coffee. Now, it smells and tastes disgusting. I can't go near a coffee shop anymore. But, truth be told, I still drink coffee with ice and "power through" it.
And I really miss the scent of fresh, clean laundry. Fresh sheets on the bed, clean towels in the bathroom, fresh/clean clothes in my closet all have the same not clean smell. What does clean mean to you? Minty fresh, lemony fresh and clean laundry all stink to me.
Loosing the sense that triggers nostalgic memories and good smells gets depressing really fast. How am I supposed to do anything or go anywhere with this disorder that follows me everywhere...
(The descriptions in this post are my personal observations. Most of those who suffer from parosmia have similar experiences. Others may notice something slightly different.)
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