The loss of smell dealt a blow to Lisa Montoya, a 44-year-old nurse in Denver who had a mild Covid-19 infection in March and recovered in April. “To me, smell is very comforting and I’ve always been super sensitive to it. I’m the kind of person who applies eucalyptus oil if I have a hard time sleeping,” she said.
Ms. Montoya hasn’t fully regained her smell, and that has damaged her enjoyment of everyday rituals. “I would grind coffee and hold it up to my nose,” she says. “Coffee is one of my favorite things and smelling in the morning made me feel awake and alive.”
— Read more in Coronavirus Patients Lose Senses of Taste, Smell—and Haven’t Gotten Them Back at The Wall Street Journal. Hat tip to Kevin!
I read an article in a Dutch newspaper about a woman who lost her sense of smell as a small child and yet went on to become a succesful writer of cookery books. Her mother taught her to use her other senses to appreciate food. She can taste the 5 basic “tongue”tastes but other than that her sense of taste is shot as well.
Specialists recommend people who have lost their sense of smell to do smell excercises. Trying to get a lot of olfactory exposure may help on the road to recovery. A professor in Dresden developed a protocol to help people recover at least part of their sense of smell.
Interesting, would not think becoming a cook would be a natural progression!
A family member has lost both senses. Another, the sense of smell. Austenfan, you give hope!
If you want to read up on it, it’s a professor in Dresden and he did his research around 2009. I’ve read on Dutch websites of ENT specialists that smell exercises are not always succesfull, but that they may help.
Will do! Thank you.