Confession

[SmellYaLater]

NC for this.

I have amnosia. As far back as I can remember I've never had a sense of smell.

It's been a big part of my identity - that might sound silly, but it was just such a big part of my day to day and everyone knew about it and it just came up ALOT.

Long story short - I moved somewhere, I thought it would just be for a year, and when the natural opportunity came up to say I couldn't smell.. I didn't. I started pretending I could smell.

I got to talk about perfumes and someone would say this smells funny, and I'd sniff it and go "ooh yeah, that smells weird". Honestly it just felt amazing to feel normal. Well to me smell isn't just normal, it's like this super power.

Cut to the present, the move has become more permanent and I've had a baby - whose nappies I can't smell so I have to do lots of visuals.

I can't tell my friends I lied. But now I have to lie forever.

AIBU that I just wanted to temporarily be thought of as able nosed?

You don’t have to lie forever. You can say you seem to have lost your sense of smell recently. It’s happened to lots of people due to COVID so no one would be overly shocked.

I don’t think you would have to lie, just don’t bring up how things smell? I don’t see how not being able to smell would come up a lot if you didn’t bring it up a lot.

Yep agree pp. infact I did loose some of my hearing after a really bad cold. It just never came back.

A lot of Mums go nose blind to their baby's nappies. But I agree that you say it's a recent thing, if you do ever need to mention it.

Easy enough to say you just seem to have lost your sense of smell.
There's no way for anyone to prove you haven't.

It actually does come up alot though. Like in the past someone would put something to my face and go "smell this - oh I forgot!" And they would be sincere, not taking the piss. But it is really freeing not being that person. So bored of saying I don't have a sense of smell. And I'm jealous that I can't enjoy smelly bath bubbles and hand creams and stuff, so I like being able to talk about them finally. I must sound so stupid.

When I was pregnant someone asked if I had any aversions and I said "no but maybe because I don't have the strongest sense of smell" so I'm trying to play that angle :S

Would losing your smell big a really big deal though? Quite upsetting? I know it's a side effect of covid so of course it would be convenient but I really don't want to start an even bigger lie.

I lost my sense of smell about 5 years ago. Prior to that I could smell most things, but never babies nappies. My own babies or others.

It’s called Anosmia.

I wish I'd had that when I was Pregnant. My morning sickness was massively increased by strong smells

Isn't it called 'Anosmia'?

Lying about it was weird. Come clean.

My hearing is not what it was and I find myself pretending to have heard /understood things people say when I haven't really because I can't be bothered and it takes up time to repeat things so I understand. Those of us who can smell probably don't realise just how much we do use the sense. Just sitting here by myself I could probably easily discriminate between up to a 100 or so smells from myself, clothes, the cat, food and drink, the rainy air outside. So I cannot imagine what not having that is like. I think we do refer to smell so much without realising so SmellYaLater is not unreasonable to be concerned. Perhaps it would be best to just say 'Oh my sense of smell is going, I can't smell that (whatever)'. Have you never had the sense or can you remember smelling anything? I don't think I have a good ' nose' but I am aware of the significance of smell daily and in memory.