Tuesday, April 21, 2009

Sense of smell

Suffering a brain injury is more traumatic than one might think. When the head experiences a very hard blow, the brain is jostled around inside the cranium. And there isn't much room for it to move around inside.
After my brain injury, my smell and taste changed very noticeably. Many foods I could no longer eat because they did not taste the way they were supposed to taste. Some foods I had to give up were chocolate, bananas, onions, fried foods. I guess in a way that can be a good thing. I tried to eat those same foods, just willing myself to pretend they tasted the way they were supposed to taste. I believed if I did this, I could somehow fool myself into believing the food tasted right. It didn't work. After three years, chocolate, fried foods and sometimes onions, depending on the type, don't taste correctly.
As for smell, that's a whole other ballgame. In a sense (no pun intended), the smell of bad odors no longer smelled bad. For example, one person I had been around didn't believe in deoderant unfortunately. I knew this person was emitting the familiar smell of body odor, but to me it smelled like a sort of soup. I then noticed that anything that smelled bad almost always smelled like soup. The soup smell wasn't necessarily a wonderful soup smell but more like perhaps one of those elementary school soup smells. I can now bear the bad smells that most other people cannot.

For a long time, gasoline didn't smell like gasoline. However I was aware that the smell I was experiencing was gasoline since I was filling up my car with gas. But it just didn't smell right.

One scent that can really make me ill though, is the scent of perfume. It is unfortunate that most people don't understand how deeply the perfume smell can upset or irritate a brain injured person. In my case, it can lead me to feel very irritated and almost as if I am dissociating. A little bit of anger or frustration can rise up as if I am really expecting that the person with the offensive perfume would ever understand that it is making me sick. It's difficult as it is to get people to understand what traumatic brain injury is.

Yesterday I was walking into a store and noticed a nearby fast food hamburger place that grills its burgers. The cooking fumes emanating from the pipe smelled to me like burned plastic. At times, I have to ask people around me what the smell is because I cannot determine it myself. Or they will remark that they smell something and I cannot smell it. Sometimes it makes me feel like I am missing a little piece of life that can be pleasant.
I wonder if I will ever be able to eat those foods again without them tasting strange. Only time will tell.
I'm willing my brain to heal.

6 comments:

  1. I was involved in head on colision when I was 12, I ended up in a comma for two weeks. It took me along time to realise that my sense of smell had gone. It took me about 10 years to feel ok again mentally and physically. There are days when I still do not smell anything. Some perfumes or peoples sweat I find can be increadably overwellming since that accident.
    Take care x

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  2. That is true.
    After a TBI, there is really an olfactory loss which would affect your taste and smell.
    That is frustrating..However, don't lose hope.. With the appropriate medication, I'm sure you will be able to recover. Go get a
    brain injury lawyer who can help you with your compensation.

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  3. thats interesting how it switched up things for you...for me my smell has been amplified by 100, it really sucks sometimes.

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  4. I have smell and taste problems still after 10 years. I completely lost my sense of smell and taste and when it started coming back everything smelled and tasted like diesel fuel. Today I can taste better but have almost no sense of smell. And if I over do something like a workout the terrible diesel smell comes back for awhile.

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  5. I write as a sign of gratitude to God, i am really happy to be alive today and see the break of another day, I lived and suffered with TBI for a very long time, I was shy and couldnt say it out because of ego issues. I suffered in silence till I was able to get herbal products by DR Jose Alessio, and with his drugs, prayers and instructions I was treated and now i am a happy survivor! pray to God and follow the instructions of Dr Jose, he has the perfect solutions for ailments,Schizophrenia,Traumatic Brain Injuries, Delusions, Brain cancer, Aphasia, Autism, Psychosis and any brain related ailment. Do not wrestle with death on your own, contact him joseherbals28@gmail.com

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