Anyone else here with Phantosmia?

[ZEROPILOT]

The virus has me somewhat stir crazy. So I'm going to see if anyone here has something I've been dealing with for about the last 2 or 3 months, PHANTOSMIA.
(Smelling something that isn't there)
I've gutted my house. My air conditioning ducts. Bleached and scoured. Looked for mold and had my wife and several friends tell me that they just don't smell anything.
I smell something musty. Kind of earthy with a bad perfume part to it. It is very often very strong and has like an ammonia like quality to it that stings my eyes and makes breathing unpleasant.
The smell is with me on and off. Mostly on. I smell it when I wake up all day until I fall asleep.
I also smell it when I'm not at home. This is a new revelation that made me realize that it's not the house.
But it seems that the smell is strongest there.
A Google search have me the name. Some causes. But no remedy that has worked.
Apparently it's not super rare.
How does a smell that doesn't exist give you real physical symptoms?
If you have ever dealt with this, please me know what you've done about it.
Thank you very much

 

[Srmcclure]

The virus has me somewhat stir crazy. So I'm going to see if anyone here has something I've been dealing with for about the last 2 or 3 months, PHANTOSMIA.
(Smelling something that isn't there)
I've gutted my house. My air conditioning ducts. Bleached and scoured. Looked for mold and had my wife and several friends tell me that they just don't smell anything.
I smell something musty. Kind of earthy with a bad perfume part to it. It is very often very strong and has like an ammonia like quality to it that stings my eyes and makes breathing unpleasant.
The smell is with me on and off. Mostly on. I smell it when I wake up all day until I fall asleep.
I also smell it when I'm not at home. This is a new revelation that made me realize that it's not the house.
But it seems that the smell is strongest there.
A Google search have me the name. Some causes. But no remedy that has worked.
Apparently it's not super rare.
How does a smell that doesn't exist give you real physical symptoms?
If you have ever dealt with this, please me know what you've done about it.
Thank you very much

I haven't experienced that, but my husband definitely is. He thinks he smells mold, but NO ONE else does (and we ask lol) and we can't find it either. We've swapped shower curtains multiple times in just 2 months in both bathrooms, bleached everywhere, but still he smells it... it makes him sneeze like crazy, but hes the only one. Idk. Its crazy

 

[Srmcclure]

We haven't found anything that helps either unfortunately. Hopefully someone can help us both out ?

 

[jsheffield]

The virus has me somewhat stir crazy. So I'm going to see if anyone here has something I've been dealing with for about the last 2 or 3 months, PHANTOSMIA.
(Smelling something that isn't there)
I've gutted my house. My air conditioning ducts. Bleached and scoured. Looked for mold and had my wife and several friends tell me that they just don't smell anything.
I smell something musty. Kind of earthy with a bad perfume part to it. It is very often very strong and has like an ammonia like quality to it that stings my eyes and makes breathing unpleasant.
The smell is with me on and off. Mostly on. I smell it when I wake up all day until I fall asleep.
I also smell it when I'm not at home. This is a new revelation that made me realize that it's not the house.
But it seems that the smell is strongest there.
A Google search have me the name. Some causes. But no remedy that has worked.
Apparently it's not super rare.
How does a smell that doesn't exist give you real physical symptoms?
If you have ever dealt with this, please me know what you've done about it.
Thank you very much

We've talked about it a bit off of TFO... I live with phantosmia and although it's a hassle,I feel lucky compared to most.

My phantom smells are almost always either pipe tobacco or Gauloise cigarettes... it really freaked me out before I figured out that some smoker want hiding out in my house, but it's way better than poop or rotting meat or fish.

Jamie

 

[KarenSoCal]

Well, you're not crazy. There are odors that some folks smell and others don't.

A true story...back in the late 70's I worked in a nurses' station of a 550 bed hospital that was the local trauma center. Our unit had recently been renovated and looked all spiffy and new.

A few months later, some of us who worked that unit started to smell a foul odor. I could smell it...it was nauseating. It was evenly distributed throughout the area, which consisted of a nurses' station and 2 long hallways with patient rooms on each side.

But other workers were totally unable to smell anything, and pretty much just thought we were imagining this. Some of the patients smelled it, some did not.

We put up with it for a couple weeks, but then insisted something needed to be done about the stench. So hospital administrators came and sniffed, most of whom walked away in perplexity because they smelled nothing.

After we complained enough, finally a workman who could smell it hilariously set out to find the source. Up and down a ladder, sniffing everything.

Turns out the ceiling tiles had been made somewhere in South America where they used river water in the process of manufacturing them. We were smelling a swamp!

ALL of the ceiling was replaced in short order!

 

[Yvonne G]

Ed, have you tried using one of those nasal flush thinga ma bobs and really, really cleaning out your nasal passages?

 

[ZEROPILOT]

Ed, have you tried using one of those nasal flush thinga ma bobs and really, really cleaning out your nasal passages?

No.
But I got nasal spray.
It didn't work.

 

[ZEROPILOT]

Well, you're not crazy. There are odors that some folks smell and others don't.

A true story...back in the late 70's I worked in a nurses' station of a 550 bed hospital that was the local trauma center. Our unit had recently been renovated and looked all spiffy and new.

A few months later, some of us who worked that unit started to smell a foul odor. I could smell it...it was nauseating. It was evenly distributed throughout the area, which consisted of a nurses' station and 2 long hallways with patient rooms on each side.

But other workers were totally unable to smell anything, and pretty much just thought we were imagining this. Some of the patients smelled it, some did not.

We put up with it for a couple weeks, but then insisted something needed to be done about the stench. So hospital administrators came and sniffed, most of whom walked away in perplexity because they smelled nothing.

After we complained enough, finally a workman who could smell it hilariously set out to find the source. Up and down a ladder, sniffing everything.

Turns out the ceiling tiles had been made somewhere in South America where they used river water in the process of manufacturing them. We were smelling a swamp!

ALL of the ceiling was replaced in short order!

I remembered back in science class that in a test. Some of us could taste things that others couldn't and that even the same tastes and smells were pleasant to some and awful to others. Everyone doesn't have the same experience from the same thing.
But, this is different because I smell it while driving my truck. And I smelled it again this morning at Walmart.
It IS however, strongest while I'm at home.
I'm relatively convinced that as strong and obnoxious as it is, that it simply is in my mind.

 

[ZEROPILOT]

I haven't experienced that, but my husband definitely is. He thinks he smells mold, but NO ONE else does (and we ask lol) and we can't find it either. We've swapped shower curtains multiple times in just 2 months in both bathrooms, bleached everywhere, but still he smells it... it makes him sneeze like crazy, but hes the only one. Idk. Its crazy

It smells moldy and musty and it's so potent that it stings my eyes and makes my throught sore.
Power of the mind?
I just don't know.
I hope it goes away like it arrived. Quickly.

 

[jsheffield]

I think the first time I was aware of mine was after a trash-burn behind my old home exposed me to some raunchy chemical smoke. I did a bit of research and that's one of the things that can precipitate phantosmia... also repeated sinus infections (which I had for years)... also a brain tumor (which I hope isn't the reason for either of ours).

Jamie

 

[Yvonne G]

It smells moldy and musty and it's so potent that it stings my eyes and makes my throught sore.
Power of the mind?
I just don't know.
I hope it goes away like it arrived. Quickly.

Try what the TV CSIs use - put a small dab of Vick's Vaporub under your nose.

 

[Srmcclure]

I think the first time I was aware of mine was after a trash-burn behind my old home exposed me to some raunchy chemical smoke. I did a bit of research and that's one of the things that can precipitate phantosmia... also repeated sinus infections (which I had for years)... also a brain tumor (which I hope isn't the reason for either of ours).

Jamie

Jeez it better not be a brain tumor... he already has seizures... that could be a cause for my husband at least. All those seizures might have crossed some wires... hes had brain scans and all that, but still...
I hope so too... we can't afford to keep replacing curtains lol

 

[ZEROPILOT]

I had also read the brain tumor link to this thing.
Today, it's pretty sharp and strong. I've been using nasal spray and it seems to help. But not for long.
Apparently it is NEVER a phantom good smell. Only bad ones.

 

[jsheffield]

I guess I'm lucky, or odd, in that the tobacco smells that seem to predominate in mine don't really bother me too much (although it did weird me out significantly at first).

J

 

[queen koopa]

Owww.. all very interesting. I read a while back about asparagus smell in urine. Some people have the ability to smell it and others don’t. Something to do with olfactory evolution or mutation possibly.

 

[queen koopa]

Maybe you guys have more evolved olfactory nerves !

 

[Blackdog1714]

Sometimes I wish mine weren't so overwhelmingly sensitive. Sadly years ago I pulled a neighbor out of his burning vehicle he had wrecked in the early morning. Took me years to get over the phantom smells I would get at the oddest times.

 

[KarenSoCal]

Odors can be triggered by all kinds of memories, even if you don't actively remember the incident causing the trigger. And it isn't always a bad memory.

For instance, now and then, a character in a TV show will light a cigarette or cigar, and I will briefly smell the smoke from it.

Or a cooking show...onions go into a pan, and I smell them.

This certainly doesn't happen super often, but it does occur.

Do you have any memory, maybe as a kid, of being in a moldy musty place? Ever locked yourself in a closet or small room? A basement? Does anything come to mind when you smell it? Is it familiar?

Did it start before or after the COVID outbreaks?

Just stuff to think about.

 

[Pointydog]

I would try the neti pot thing if it happened to me. I am one of those people who can smell things no one else can.
I chase down air leaks in my old house by the smell of wood in a draft....and tell if a person or animal has a liver or kidney problem by the smell of their skin.
But everything I smell is actually there...if it happened to me like you describe, I would try flushing out my sinuses somehow.
It would really frustrate me if I couldn't rely on my sense of smell.

 

[ZEROPILOT]

I would try the neti pot thing if it happened to me. I am one of those people who can smell things no one else can.
I chase down air leaks in my old house by the smell of wood in a draft....and tell if a person or animal has a liver or kidney problem by the smell of their skin.
But everything I smell is actually there...if it happened to me like you describe, I would try flushing out my sinuses somehow.
It would really frustrate me if I couldn't rely on my sense of smell.

Well, @Pointydog
I sure wish you lived closer.
I could use that nose here right now.
I just made dinner and smelled none of it. Just this stank.
One more friend, a neighbor, also confirmed that there is no smell in my house.