Dr. McDougall's Online Discussion Board

This is a serious question that I have never heard discussed:

Some years ago I lost my sense of smell after using a zinc nasal spray only once when I had a bad cold. It stung and I never used it again. I recovered, but lost my sense of smell. I saw doctors and had all kinds of tests including an MRI to rule out a brain tumor. They could find nothing. A few years later I read that zinc nasal spray could cause permanent loss of smell. (Duh!)

A little bit of my sense of smell has returned, but things don't smell the same, and some of what I smell (faintly) is unpleasant.

No big deal. It's not like I lost my vision or hearing. But, I no longer enjoy my food. I can still taste sweet, salty, sour and bitter, but not flavors like garlic, basil, vanilla or other more subtle flavors. And those I can detect are not pleasant. Basil now has a kind of moldy taste, for example.

I no longer enjoy eating except for fruits and other sweet things. Other than that, I don't really want to eat.

Have any of you experienced this?

I can tell you that when I went vegan when I was 21 walking past a regular restaurant, not even a fast food place smelled to me like I was walking by a dumpster. The smell was so disgusting. Many years passed and then because of some life issues I was in a situation where I had to eat some animal products again. Going vegan the next time did not trigger this reaction to smells (thank goodness) although smells of peoples' cooking in my building don't smell appetizing at all.

I had covid around two years ago and my sense of smell and taste disappeared. They have just about almost come back all the way though they are still a bit dull. Some tastes came back sooner than others. For example, it took longer for the best savory tastes to come back. Sweeter and plain things are still easier to eat.

Vanilla Orchid wrote:Some years ago I lost my sense of smell after using a zinc nasal spray only once when I had a bad cold. It stung and I never used it again.

Wow - I'm so sorry this happened to you.

I'm so sorry you lost your sense of smell. I don't think people understand how horrible this really is.

I lost my sense of smell after a cold around 2008. I didn't take Zicam or any other zinc nasal spray but lost it anyway. For a couple months I really couldn't smell anything at all (anosmia). Over the course of months it came back to some degree but it really isn't any where near as good as before I lost it.

I don't get distorted sense of smell (Parosmia) but to this day I can take a bite of food and smell/taste it, take a second bite and smell/taste it... then its gone (hyposmia)

I think the problem I have is I end up overeating cause I just never feel satisfied when the food loses it's flavor. Sometimes I have been very attracted to sweets like jelly bellies because I can enjoy sweet, and when I eat one the flavor comes through. If I keep switching flavors then the new ones come through. Or Ill find myself going for rice cakes smeared with vegetable better than bullion, or salty pretzels. Having a bad sense of smell can really make it tempting to go for the sugar and salt.

I wonder if with all the covid anosmia if there has been any good new research or promising treatments for restoring smell. I remember looking into the taste and smell clinic in Washington DC (Robert Henkin) who uses theophylline to treat smell disorders. I don't know if it works. You could look into someone like that. I never went.

Anecdotally I honestly feel like my sense of smell improves when I'm drinking plenty of coffee. When I quit coffee for this program what little sense of smell I had disappeared. It improved when I started drinking coffee again. I also feel like it improved after I started taking amla powder... but hard to say. It's still not great by any means.

I'm better off than you from the sound of it but I have gotten hit hard enough by this sort of thing to have empathy. Hang in there and keep eating the right foods

So sorry to hear this, my mom lost her sense of smell/taste after chemo. They said it "should" come back, it's been years and it has really been detrimental to her heath. She has eating disorders to begin with, so making food taste bad or like nothing at all makes it easier to not eat. I really hope you can find a solution for this and hope that it isn't a lifelong thing for you.

Thank you for all the feedback. In the scheme of things, it's not a big deal. I'm otherwise fully functional. I just don't really enjoy most food. Maybe I'll try coffee. I do sometimes have a bit of decafe.

I recently took a scratch and sniff test as part of a clinical study related to Parkinson's disease. They wanted to test people who had lost their sense of smell since they think it's somehow related to Parkinson's, and I'm always game to be a guinea pig for research purposes.

Very depressing. All of the items in the test "smelled" exactly the same to me, confirming that I have absolutely no sense of smell.

I'm certain of the cause, and it's not Parkinson's, but still depressing. As far as I know there is no cure in sight (for my condition).

I lost my sense of smell in late 2019. I had been sick but did not realize for a long time that I had had covid. All this time later and I can still only smell bleach and not much else. I have decided to appreciate that I cannot smell obnoxious smells and not worry about it.

debknott wrote:I lost my sense of smell in late 2019. I had been sick but did not realize for a long time that I had had covid. All this time later and I can still only smell bleach and not much else. I have decided to appreciate that I cannot smell obnoxious smells and not worry about it.

Unfortunately, not being able to smell obnoxious odors means you are less able to protect yourself from dangers. I cannot smell gas, or food burning. I used to be able to tell when something in the oven was nearly done because it started to smell done. Now, I'd better set a timer and I'd better take it with me if I go downstairs (the kitchen is upstairs).

I hope your sense of smell returns.

Yes, I agree that losing my sense of smell is not a good thing. I just try to look at it with optimism. I hope it comes back too, but it seems unlikely after more than three years this way.

I'm so sorry this has happened to you, Vanilla Orchid!
The only thing I can think of is, a year or more ago when a relative lost his senses of taste and smell after having covid, I gave him small containers to smell several times a day and to take at least 10 deep breaths of each each session. One was of coffee beans, one a cotton ball with lots of drops of lemon essential oil, another with peppermint essential oil, another with clove essential oil. He said it helped some, but he never kept up the schedule. If you search covid and smell therapy, you may come up with some ideas, even though you did not lose your sense of smell from covid. By the way, that is scary that you got it after only one use of the nasal spray! If only people knew of the potential side effects....

Mom+Me wrote:I'm so sorry this has happened to you, Vanilla Orchid!
The only thing I can think of is, a year or more ago when a relative lost his senses of taste and smell after having covid, I gave him small containers to smell several times a day and to take at least 10 deep breaths of each each session. One was of coffee beans, one a cotton ball with lots of drops of lemon essential oil, another with peppermint essential oil, another with clove essential oil. He said it helped some, but he never kept up the schedule. If you search covid and smell therapy, you may come up with some ideas, even though you did not lose your sense of smell from covid. By the way, that is scary that you got it after only one use of the nasal spray! If only people knew of the potential side effects....

Thank you! I will try that. What have I got to lose?

I just Googled Covid and loss of smell and look what I found:
https://med.stanford.edu/news/all-news/ ... h%20plasma.

Stanford is not far from where I live. I'm going to contact this doctor and see what she thinks about my situation.

Wow! It's great that you found this information. I am praying that you will get your sense of smell and taste back via the treatments this lady offers. Let us know how it goes.

I have an update! I sent my primary care doctor information about the Stanford study, and she referred me to an ENT who knew the doctor conducting the study. He did not think she was taking new participants now, but in any case, one of the criteria was having already tried retraining the sense of smell. The ENT was pessimistic it would work for me because my sense of smell had been gone for so long. He said the doctors I saw in 2007 should have tried the re-training back then. They tried nothing. But, what did I have to lose?

So, I have to use a kind of saline nasal rinse every day, followed by Flonase. Then, at least twice per day I sniff four different kinds of essential oils while visualizing what they are supposed to smell like. The smells are one each fruity, spicy, resinous, and floral. So I got a little bottle of sweet orange, clove bud, eucalyptus, and rose. The very first time I tried, I was able to detect a very faint odor from the eucalyptus. Not much, but it was something. I have hope!