I think I may have phantosmia. No, I’d never heard of it, either, but according to the interweb, it’s ‘a condition that causes you to smell odours that aren’t actually present.’ And that’s what has happened on a couple of occasions since I had Covid in February this year. Today it was cigarette smoke in my house.
The thing is that there were only two people in the house: myself and my partner/carer. And neither of us had smoked since 31st December 1993. I know that cigarette smoke has a tendency to linger but for over 28 years? it seems unlikely, doesn’t it?
My partner couldn’t smell it, but curiously she could smell cigarette smoke when she was in a smoke-free office in London today. The smell soon passed but, as with me, it was a weird sensation.
My partner caught Covid in June of 2021 and has had issues with her sense of smell ever since. My post Covid issues have been far more muscular pains, more severe asthma at a time when my asthma usually eases off for the summer and tiredness, which is at least not so bad as the sheer exhaustion I felt when I was testing positive. Have I got Long Covid?
The NHS lists the following symptoms of long Covid. They include:
- extreme tiredness (fatigue)
- shortness of breath
- chest pain or tightness
- problems with memory and concentration (“brain fog”)
- difficulty sleeping (insomnia)
- heart palpitations
- dizziness
- pins and needles
- joint pain
- depression and anxiety
- tinnitus, earaches
- feeling sick, diarrhoea, stomach aches, loss of appetite
- a high temperature, cough, headaches, sore throat, changes to sense of smell or taste
- rashes
I’ve got a few of these already, but which ones are ongoing and were before there before Covid and which ones are new? There’s little doubt that Long Covid exists but given how new this virus is, I wonder if a medical professional would give a more accurate diagnosis than I ever could?
The advice is to see a GP if any of these symptoms continue, but have you tried to get an appointment lately? This year so far, we’ve messages from our local health centre advising us to not contact them unless you are close to death. For something as minor as tiredness might not be regarded as an emergency.
Science is looking at Long Covid, collecting evidence and sooner or later we will know just how bad it is. As a glass half empty man, I fear we will learn some unpleasant lessons from Covid and that long list above may even be complemented by some even worse stuff.
Either way, it wasn’t nice to smell fag smoke today. I’ve grown to absolutely loathe it over the years which I’ve regarded very much as A Good Thing. Tonight the smell has disappeared. What on earth is going on?
