March 13, 2021: Day 90
Over the past 2 months, most symptoms vanished. The exceptions are the strong fatigue and loss of taste & smell. I have become accustomed to detecting only the texture of foods. I now describe food as rubber, plastic, soggy cardboard, or sand. Beverages are either room temperature, hot, or cold.
There have been brief flashes of taste and/or smell, particularly for strong odors and taste (cinnamon, oranges, kimchi), but after a single dose they disappear.
I have learned a new vocabulary of medical terms to describe these symptoms:
- anosmia: partial or full loss of smell
- hyposmia: decreased sensitivity to smells
- phantosmia: phantom smells (smelling odors which are not present) such as burning rubber, cigarette smoke, chemicals, rotten or moldy
- ageusia: loss of taste
- hypogeusia: diminished ability to taste sweet, sour, bitter, or salty
I’ve read about smell retaining therapies (Olfactory Retraining) to help recovery by using for several weeks the same 4 + scents daily. These usually include rose, lemon, clove, and eucalyptus. I tried that, with no effect. There are commercially available kits which contain those essential oils. Had I purchased…
