How do you turn your nose off or deal with a heinous smell?

Ask Lemmy@lemmy.world – 83 points – 9 months ago

I'm going to visit my grandfather this weekend. His house smells like a skunk rolled around in some rotten cabbages, died, and got eaten and pooped out by a water buffalo. Thankfully I dont have to sleep there, but I do have to visit for a few hours, a couple days in a row. Last time, I wore a mask with mint toothpaste rubbed inside, which didn't help at all.

Google is failing me; the only results I can find are how to get rid of a smell, and that's just not possible here without a great deal of fire. So can anyone recommend how to live with a uniquely terrible smell for a few days?

Fun fact: Incense was historically used for funerary purposes. It hides the smell of decaying bodies. It's also used in some churches, pilgrims can be very smelly. The egyptians used frankincense for mummification.

The smell is probably from the sewer btw. It's possible the water level in one of the sinks or toilets is too low, but your grandfather doesn't notice the smell anymore. It may be enough to simply run the taps a bit.

Or your grandpa murdered someone and hid them under the floorboards.

I worked in an office that had a water fountain that everyone stopped using after we got a filtered dispenser installed in the kitchen. Every couple of weeks or so we'd walk in the door first thing in the morning and get a nice little aromatic reminder to run a little bit of water through it...

Yeah despite OP's colourful description they didn't really describe the smell. Does it smell like sewerage? Do as you suggested. Does it smell like something dead? Check for dead nice or rats? If it just smells like old man, open some windows or put on a load of laundry. Spoiled food - clean out the kitchen.

Or a patient escaped from your local mental hospital, killed your grandpa and assumed his identity. If that sounds stupid, don't worry, it's already a movie plot

That happened to my grandpa but he was okay.

Pick up a jar of vick's vapo rub. Put some under your nose and in the mask if you wear one again.

Yeah this worked in silence of the lambs.

This works fairly well and is inconspicuous. Go to the bathroom and reapply as needed.

I have zero tips for you, but I love this post. Why does his house smell so bad? Has anyone mentioned it to him? So many questions.

Idk. We're not close, we've lived at least 8 hours apart most of my life. He has 7 kids and some of them live close and check on him regularly. They know about the smell but I'm not sure whether they've talked to him. He's 95, in good health, and lives alone in a retirement community.

Smell the poor man’s bed sheets

There are specialist face masks with active charcoal filters that filter out smells.

Tell him his house smells like ass

Sensitivity to smells will dissipate over a short time. Your senses will pay more attention to novel stimuli, so your nose will eventually get "bored" of it and stop even noticing it when you are acclimated enough.

This is, unfortunately, probably your best answer. In the hospital Vicks vapor rub around the nostrils works for short periods, for long periods you just endure knowing that in less than an hour your body will ignore the smell. If you want to know more, Google "nose blindness" or "olfactory fatigue"

That never happened for me last time. After visiting for hours, I had to decline the guest bed and sleep in the car.

Laughs in neurodivergent hyperosmia

Fun fact: one of the symptoms I get of migraine is the inability to ignore smells. At all. Cat owners? Your house smells like ammonia. Cologne wearers? You still stink underneath the cloying odor. Cleaning products? Smell forever. I get to choose between smelling my own halitosis or the unbearable mint odor for hours on end.

I don't get migraines, but I've experienced smells like what you described. Not often, maybe once a year, my nose will turn up to 100 and I can smell everything in the house. And it's not pleasant. Not even cooking and delicious food smells good, because the combination of smells are nausea inducing.

Interesting, I also have migraines and they also make me hypersensitive to smells (apart from the typical sensitivity to light and sound).

@phanto
Fun fact: cat owners have solved this problem because the ammonia kills your ability to smell over time. This doesn't apply to all cat owners of course, you need to ignore the smell for a while to let the ammonia kick in.
I just wouldn't recommend this method to OP since the effect is hardly reversible.
@Okokimup

Can you not just visit with him outside on some lawn chairs? Or does the outside smell as well?

In my experience with proper stinks, you wait and you'll get used to it.

I once entered into a underground sewage treatement plant and the smell was almost physical. However after sometime your nose starts to become dissensitised to it.

Ditto when we had to work with SO2 gas (which smells like rotten eggs) in our Chemistry classes: pretty sickening to begin with, then eventually you get used to it (which was funny because we could hear the students from other, unrelated classes in the rooms nearby, complaining loudly about it whilst we didn't really care about it anymore ;)).

Is it just his place or the entire retirement community place? It might be something property management is doing or not doing

Haven't done it myself but people who deal with corpses supposedly take Vicks vapor rub and rub it under their nose

Help your grandfather fix the smell problem.

You could try keeping your mask inside a container with a few spoons of coffee grounds. (Use a paper towel to avoid dirtying the mask.)

If it's any consolation, the smell will probably become less unbearable in the following days, as you get used to it.

Also, depending on how close you are to your grandpa, you could find some tactful way to mention it. People don't often realise how much their houses stink.

Foam earplugs, shoved gently up your nose, but not so far you can’t get them back again, and a face mask to hide them.

not so far you can't get them back again

New fear unlocked.

This could be difficult to apply for such an extended period of time, but I generally have good results by just breathing exclusively through my mouth. Pretend you're underwater and breathing through a snorkel.

This technique has gotten me through many a fart and temporary sewage/fertilizer exposure.

So you'd rather taste it than smell it?

Most of what we experience as taste is actually smell. It's generally not an issue.

The trick is to not put the smelly thing inside your mouth.

Breathe through your mouth, not your nose.

What a great description 😆

Honestly, I don't think there's much you can do but I have a relative who is a nurse and they mentioned they double up on face masks and basically overdose on strongly smelling stuff. Mint drops, gum, toothpaste between the masks, essential oils, etc. I know you're not looking for ways to deal with the smell but opening some windows will help as well.

Thanks for being honest with us.