February 5, 2004
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Anosmia
Yippee! Google has come through for me again.
I’ve had this symptom of anosmia, lose my sense of smell completely for long periods of time, for many years. I’d never seen that on any of the ME/fibromyalgia symptom lists, but lately had noticed a pattern. When I’m in a flareup, the smeller doesn’t work. As the fog clears, all six or seven of my senses clear up including that of smell.
I had always attributed the loss of smell to some harsh chemicals an EENT specialist once swabbed into my nose, supposedly to toughen the membranes and “cure” my allergies. The treatment (of course) didn’t seem to have any effect on the allergies (just kept me from going back to that doctor), but I did lose my sense of smell temporarily and then periodically ever since. Now I’ve begun to doubt that his primitive medicine was the sole cause, at any rate, of my anosmia.
This morning, I wanted to see what I could find on the web on this subject. My search terms were, “anosmia fibromylagia.” It netted for me this fine article with much food for thought, about the apparent viral triggers of the disorder:
Myalgic Encephalomyelitis/Chronic Fatigue Syndrome: Guidelines for Doctors
Comments (4)
good that you found out that it was caused by that.
I was born anosmic (as opposed, I guess, to being ‘born again anosmic’), so whenever I see the word in print, I get excited about it. So I was exicted to see your entry, and here I am leaving a comment.
I’m amazed that anyone would swab harsh chemicals inside someone’s nose to prevent allergies. I suppose he wanted to let some blood, too, eh?
I read that link yesterday… and I’m still stunned today. I’ve read some on fybromyalgia, and on Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (which I somehow didn’t relate to Myalgic Encephalomyelitis) since I believed 2 decades ago I suffered from that. I have not read anything that laid out symptoms and possible causes and effects and drugs in the way that site does.
At first I was blown away because there is a condition mentioned in that page that I have had for almost 30 yrs, and it’s been bad for 10. I’ve talked to doctors and even been sent to specialists and no one seemed to know what I was talking about. But there it was – listed as though it’s something everyone would know about.
Then I read further and further and I kept finding things that are part of my family’s medical history. I don’t know if it’s good or bad that they are there, but there just might be something out there that might start to make sense.
I am as disgusted with the medical profession as you seem to be. I’ve found very few doctors that know anything (tho they insist they do) or will listen to me. I can’t, however, easily find a decent doctor – the medical system is so bad here doctors won’t take new patients, nor do they care much about patient care. I will have to gather up as much knowledge as I can, and confont my current GP with it, and hopefully I can get him to run the appropriate tests instead of the common ones.
My God, Kathy.. I learn so much from you…. Thankyou
It’s interesting to note that they say the docs have learned a lot just from reading journals and notes written by the patients.
oooooh…what they could glean from your notes!!!!