When does the taste and smell come back

[SummersBreeze]

I am on day 6 of this infection. First time having covid. I am fully vaccinated.

The main symptoms for me were fever and body aches.

Then on Wednesday a yogurt i ate was bland. I was able to taste 'sweet' from the tub but that was it.

On Thursday I discovered some medicine tasting off. Then I wasn't able to get other tastes from foods. Cheese was like rubber. Coffee was like warm sweetness. A cup of tea might as well have been a cup of warm sugary piss. It was horrifying.

My smell is gone too.

This is by far the most distressing thing for me.

When does it come back?

I'm having a similar thing. A lot of things I used to like, I just can't taste or smell them anymore. So weird. Been nearly a year for me

I lost taste and smell - got it back 2 weeks later.

Mine has just gone. It's making me very tearful. Or maybe that's the anxiety generally. It's making me feel claustrophobic or something. Not sure if that's the right word.

Mine just took a few days to come back, it was gradual, taste came back first, smell a couple of days later.

I found the loss of taste and smell extremely stressful. It's coming back to me now, thank goodness but it's slow. Its dull. I can taste sweet and salty and there's some flavours coming back to me. Like strawberry jelly. The smell is still a bit dull. It's coming back but slower.
Coffee tastes burnt to me. It's weird.

dh had it in December and still not come back ☹️

First had it in Oct 21 and have had it twice since. Smell and taste have never returned to normal. Nothing smells right and some things I just cannot smell. I hate that I can't tell if something smells bad. Most sweet things taste okayish but most savoury items are just weird. Some things I loved I no longer eat as their original taste has never come back. I'm not really expecting a change now to be honest. It does bother me sometimes but I try not to think about it too much.

I’m a year after covid
my taste came back about 30% of what it was after a few weeks and has stayed at about 50%- just very muted and no subtlety or depth of flavours.
Smell came back slowly but again is not full but some specific smells are now markedly different to what I previously knew the thing to smell like . It’s really odd. I also smelt random really strong smells like burning that weren’t there (no evidence of burning for example and no one else could smell it) for about six months.

Mine totally disappeared on day 2
came back a bit on day 4 but came and went
was back properly after a week

I ate things like toast and jam/marmalade (foods I’m not normally fussed on) as at least I could get some texture and some sweet/sharpness from the jam/marmalade

Just asked DS covid in May last year still not right. Sorry OP

I'm ten days in now and cannot smell a thing, food tastes of salt or sweet and that's it. I'm going on holiday next weekend, really hoping I can taste by then. We'll be camping at a festival so I'd be happy to still have reduced smelling capacity

I'm ready to bash my fucking face in.

You might never get it back. Perhaps getting on a waiting list for some counselling might be a good idea.

I had Delta in November 2021. My taste and smell went completely for about two weeks and then came back in fits and starts over a couple of days. Some things took longer to taste 'right' (tea being the main one - sorry, OP!) and I seem to be more sensitive to chemical smells in things like soap and washing powder now.

I had mine exactly the same time as you and I'm still without smell or taste. It's been 19 months now

For those with long term full loss what do you eat now. I'm in a place where I feel hungry but can't even be bothered to eat because I can't taste an absolute thing. Its quite distressing. I know i need to eat but its pointless to me. I had a fairly healthy diet before so am just sticking to healthy food as no point in eating any of the sweet food I used to enjoy as it makes me really sad. I'm a healthy weight but losing a few pounds will be fine so there is that I suppose.

I lost my sense of taste for a week but my sense of smells has been gone for 10 months now. Some days I can just about smell really strong smells but the rest of the time there's nothing. I'm kind of used to it now and I get excited when I can occasionally smell things 😅

Had covid last week. Lost smell and taste for about 12 hours!

Mine has now mostly come back after 2 days. Apparently (anecdotally) it's taking an average of 2 to 5 days with this variant. Horrible thing to experience even for a short while. Very sorry for those of you who haven't got it back.

For those of you struggling keep smelling things even if you can’t smell them to try and wake the cells up.

I was wondering the same, as I've just had Covid for the first time. I'm 11 days in with no taste/smell yet. Everyone I know so far has had theirs return within days, making me feel worse. Now I read it can be months or more😥. It's miserable. Sorry to others suffering. Hope it returns

@WotNoLoobrush its frustrating to do this when you can’t smell it but try to keep smelling a rotation of things like lavender, different fruits and perfume/scent every day.

Thanks. I'll try that.

At least it's coming back! My sister got covid early and never regained her smell or taste - over two years now. She has calcification on her whatever they are. She loves to cook and bake too!
Plus it's dangerous- there was a gas leak at her house and she didn't smell it til someone came over and did as soon as they opened the door. She used to have a very keen sense of smell.
But she philosophical about it - she knows people who died of covid.

Not sure if it helped but on day 2 of losing my smell I kept taking several little sniffs of Vickes followed by sniffs of coffee. Its unnerving getting nothing but gradually I got faint smells from them which, if nothing else, made me feel a lot better. It's also possible if helped me to get my smell fully back but obviously can't prove that and it wouldn't work for everyone.

Thought I'd say in case it does help someone else though.

@RoxieLoxy Thats what I did and I started to get what I’d describe as ‘notes’ of the smell back slowly and then it was like turning a volume switch up the more I did it, there was a bit of back and forth for anyone reading I.e one day it was just completely gone again or gone for part of the day.

Sitting in fresh air seems to help, somewhere where you can smell greenery or flowers.

Whether I was outside it seemed to reduce the foul smoky smell I had.