My husband thinks I'm crazy. I sometimes agree.
Something interesting happened to me when we conceived our son. For the first time in my life, I had a keen sense of smell. One would think that's a given- those who have met me know that my nose is out there a ways... a nice legacy of native American, German, and English heritage sloping off my face, but no- usually it was mildly stuffy and missed plenty of things. It was sudden. I went to bed one night perfectly fine, oblivious to the world of scents and was quite fine with that. The next morning, thanks to the hormones, I could smell the dog two floors beneath us. Or maybe just her bed in the corner of our room. Then my husband put on cologne, and I thought my head would explode. Then I arrived at work and was greeted by a cacophony of smells- body sprays, lotions, air fresheners, colognes, foods, dust, moldy office carpet, computers, printers, and a weird smoky smell that apparently I was the only one able to pick up... I smelled that alllll 39 weeks.
Now I'm 15.5 months postpartum. I still have a sense of smell like no other. It's like a bizarre evolutionary characteristic. I'm sure that at some point in the distant past when we were all living in caves and grunting at each other that this was a useful means of detecting whether a food source was going to help or harm one's offspring, but in our new and modern world... maybe not as necessary?
I love it sometimes though... I can tell about 30 seconds before my son gets upset about his diaper that it's wet. I can easily pinpoint what's gone funky in the fridge without much effort. I can tell my husband has been eating fast food before dinner (occasionally he stops for a 'snack' after class), and what he had to eat. I no longer have to measure aromatic spices for things like spaghetti, pumpkin pie, chili, tacos, or oatmeal raisin cookies because I can go by smell. I successfully discovered also that my husband had loosely connected the gas line on our stove when he installed it, it had passed the bubble test but still had a small, slow leak.
I am also not a fan of this superpower some days... like when my husband insists on putting fabric softener in the laundry, or wear cologne like he used to- I just prefer the smell of him, not covered in 'stuff'. I can smell my mother-in-law's perfume/air-freshener/laundry detergent/fabric softener combo when I walk in the door on the days she watches E... and can smell her on him for hours after she goes home. I am very sensitive to perfumes and some of them are quite nauseating still.
Anyone else deal with this? Does it ever go away?
Something interesting happened to me when we conceived our son. For the first time in my life, I had a keen sense of smell. One would think that's a given- those who have met me know that my nose is out there a ways... a nice legacy of native American, German, and English heritage sloping off my face, but no- usually it was mildly stuffy and missed plenty of things. It was sudden. I went to bed one night perfectly fine, oblivious to the world of scents and was quite fine with that. The next morning, thanks to the hormones, I could smell the dog two floors beneath us. Or maybe just her bed in the corner of our room. Then my husband put on cologne, and I thought my head would explode. Then I arrived at work and was greeted by a cacophony of smells- body sprays, lotions, air fresheners, colognes, foods, dust, moldy office carpet, computers, printers, and a weird smoky smell that apparently I was the only one able to pick up... I smelled that alllll 39 weeks.
Now I'm 15.5 months postpartum. I still have a sense of smell like no other. It's like a bizarre evolutionary characteristic. I'm sure that at some point in the distant past when we were all living in caves and grunting at each other that this was a useful means of detecting whether a food source was going to help or harm one's offspring, but in our new and modern world... maybe not as necessary?
I love it sometimes though... I can tell about 30 seconds before my son gets upset about his diaper that it's wet. I can easily pinpoint what's gone funky in the fridge without much effort. I can tell my husband has been eating fast food before dinner (occasionally he stops for a 'snack' after class), and what he had to eat. I no longer have to measure aromatic spices for things like spaghetti, pumpkin pie, chili, tacos, or oatmeal raisin cookies because I can go by smell. I successfully discovered also that my husband had loosely connected the gas line on our stove when he installed it, it had passed the bubble test but still had a small, slow leak.
I am also not a fan of this superpower some days... like when my husband insists on putting fabric softener in the laundry, or wear cologne like he used to- I just prefer the smell of him, not covered in 'stuff'. I can smell my mother-in-law's perfume/air-freshener/laundry detergent/fabric softener combo when I walk in the door on the days she watches E... and can smell her on him for hours after she goes home. I am very sensitive to perfumes and some of them are quite nauseating still.
Anyone else deal with this? Does it ever go away?
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