Covid, loss of smell. Any positive stories about it coming back?

[IvorCutler]

I’m 4 days in to my first ever bout of Covid. Yesterday my sense of smell went completely. I keep spraying perfume and holding things under my nose but nothing is happening. My taste is odd too but I can differentiate between sweet/salty/spicy.

I suffer with anxiety and I’m really concerned about it not coming back… I know millions of people have been through the same and I’m probably being unnecessarily dramatic about it.

If you lost your sense of smell during Covid how long did it take to return?

About 6-9 months I think and my sense of smell is still altered and there are things I can no longer eat.

Wow @Kbear that’s a really long time. I’m sorry things still aren’t right, it sounds awful.

I lost my smell and taste entirely with COVID. It came back after a week. Don't panic

Thanks @MoonlightMedicine

For many months I couldn't bear the smell of previously much loved perfumes, coffee brewing smelled like something was burning, I can't eat capsicum peppers anymore and I loved them before, trying to think what else tastes weird....

I never had covid test but assume I had covid right at the start

I’m 11 months in. Can sense a bad odour but not actually smell it. Difficult to explain. I can’t smell nice things- perfume, flowers, chocolate etc.

About 7 weeks for mine to come back. I was haunted by a perfume smell for a few weeks before- I was certain I could smell it, but also knew it wasn’t really there. Very odd.

I was really ill with covid for several weeks. My full sense of taste and smell came back shortly after returning to work. Roughly two months after contracting the disease.

I haven’t noticed any lasting effects.

Even quicker for me, couldn’t smell a thing on the Friday - sprayed strong perfume on my wrist to test it. By Tuesday, I could smell the test patch from Friday! (By which I discovered that I clearly don’t scrub my wrists in the shower …😆)

Mine came back after a week!

I've just had it and tested negative a week ago. My smell comes and goes but my taste returned immediately. I'm still very sniffly though and feel constantly bunged up.

Mine started coming back after a month or so but 2yrs down the line it's still wrong. Things taste different and there are things I can't eat at all now as they taste awful. I get phantom smells that aren't real too.
I think it's broken forever! But everyone I know that lost their smell/taste got it back to some degree within a few months.

It’s such a weird virus. My husband is just getting over it and he has his sense of smell but he says lots of things taste horrible. Which is quite insulting when I’ve made him dinner! I’m worried I’m going to inadvertently give someone food poisoning or burn the house down because I don’t know what I’m doing.

A few weeks for me. Try not to worry

I'm getting mine back now after about 5 days. I was also panicking a bit! I was still testing faintly positive yesterday too. Such a weird thing now being able to smell or taste! Give it a bit longer.

My husband is just getting over it and he has his sense of smell but he says lots of things taste horrible.

That echoes my own experience. Coffee tasted foul.

Took me 2 weeks then back to normal.

Dd had covid in October and lost her sense off taste and smell. Taste came back quickly, but she still can’t smell anything 8 months later. I keep wondering if I need to get it checked as it’s been so long, but I don’t think there is anything the doctor could do?

Sorry no. Two and a half years now and no sign of smell or taste returning properly.

It's been 20 months and still not back properly. I can differentiate between sweet, sour, salty, etc but no nuance in flavour, just different combinations of those flavours. I tell food apart by that and texture.

I know when there is a strong smell but not what it is. Most of these false smells are a combo of sweet and smoky. I have set fire to a tea towel by accident when cooking, turned my back and not known which worried me.

The only smell that gets through anything like how I remember it is truffle oil. I have it on anything!!

I had a bad dose in December, 4 days after getting my 3rd booster. I lost my taste and smell almost immediately, and 7 months on, I wouldn't say they're back to normal by any stretch. In fact my sense of smell is so unpredictable that I mentioned it to my GP when I had my coil changed last week - she said it's very normal and that many patients have reported the same.

Mine went completely for two days but prior to that three or four days of everything tasting bitter. Then it gradually came back.

Almost everyone regains it within a year.
Mine took about 11 months. I don't think omicron is that nasty though, for damaging sense of smell.

Lost mine on 9th October 2020
No smell at all for ages. I now have 6 generic smells- all unpleasant
Occasionally get a whiff of something else if close and get very excited but it is really sustained. No wider environmental smell

rarely sustained