I have congenital anosmia. Don't have to look it up, I'm gonna tell you, it's the lifelong inability to smell. Like someone born blind, I cannot miss it, I never had it, Also, I can't actually understand the concept on a personal basis, only as an abstract. As a child, people would sometimes talk about something smelling good(a flower maybe) and hold it to their face and inhale deeply. I'd imitate them, but there was nothing there.
More people complain about it than not. So, it can't be much. However, I have a deep paranoia about having rotten garlic that rolled behind the refrigerator or something,
And not sure if people tell me everything smells fine because it's true, or because they don't want to offend me. How could I know?
So, when loss of smell was listed as one of the side effects of covid, I was thinking...all those curses from covid, along with this one blessing! When I shock my well every few years....I cannot smell the bleach, so have to talk somebody into coming around to let me know when the water has bleach in it, and when it's clean. Covid patients wouldn't be able to smell the bleach Dr Blump prescribed!!(I can tell you from actual experience a little bleach still in the water burns the tip of your tongue)
They couldn't smell their bodies rotting, like one of the earlier SAV ladies, nor could they smell the constant diarrhea. Or their fingers(and toes) rotting off.
Lucky, lucky, lucky.( I hope you know the joke that was the start of...Don't call me Lucky Lucky, call me Lucky Lucky Lucky!)
One good side effect of Covid is that I don't have to rotate dinner each year with some right wing relatives over the holidays. Especially their spoiled grandchildren. I cancelled our dinners in 2020 and haven't looked back.
I know someone who lost their sense of smell after a brain injury. His children love to take advantage of it and will play games of “chocolate, or poop?” I cannot imagine not being able to smell the difference.
I have (had) a heightened sense of smell. I smell things other people cannot. Smelling smoke well before others means i have to convince people there is smoke and possibly fire and have to go sniff it out and put it out. People think I am nuts until they see the flames...
I have likely had COVID twice now, given I have had symptoms but not a positive test. I believe I present differently (As I often do) So now it is so weird because I have not been able to smell the coffee brewing or the flower I hate when in bloom as it smells so strong I normally gag. Today, the flower was in full bloom and I could not even smell it right under my nose. Being smell diminishes greatly as you age, we are all catching up to you!
FYI, Think of music wafting to your ears and triggering a memory or the blasting of horns in rush hour and that is what smell is like. An alert to the brain, which may or may not reach the pleasure centre. The smell of coffee used to jolt me awake more than the caffeine.
I worked for a man who lost his sense of smell after an auto accident. Not an easy life.
Losing one's sense of smell is NOT good! When you can't smell things, you won't be alerted to a gas leak or a fire in another room.