Smell flashbacks?

[Jumpinbare]

If I encounter an unusual, or unpleasant, or just strong odor, for the next day or few days, despite bathing, changing clothes, being in a different place, etc, I distinctly smell the odor again and again. When I have asked others present if they smell it, no one ever does, leading me to conclude it is an olfactory halucination. Does anyone else here have that happen? If so, is it frequent?

 

[Outdated]

I have a very sensitive nose even though I've been a heavy smoker for 40 years. I don't use much laundry detergent in my washing because I can't stand the smell lingering in my clothes.

I get smell flashbacks when watching movies or looking at pictures, especially scenes with dust or smoke but a lot of other smells too. I remember years ago the movie industry trying to experiment with Smellovision, that never went anywhere but I related to it at the time because that's what I already have.

Big tip if you grow a beard - never shampoo your moustache, that smell right under your nose all day is horrible.

 

[Rodafina]

@Jumpinbare
What you describe sounds really familiar to me. In my head I call it getting a smell stuck in my nose.

It reminds me of something else that happens to me where two smells can merge into one and become very unpleasant. A strange but specific example that comes to mind is when a certain laundry detergent someone in my family was using became fused with the smell of a latrine. During a camping excursion, I was around a latrine for a lot longer than I wished and I could smell the laundry detergent at the same time. For years after that, the smell of the laundry detergent alone brought up the unpleasant feelings of the latrine smell. I could not fully understand it, but it was unmistakable in my nose.

 

[Angular Chap]

Yes, I know exactly what you mean, I experienced it just the other day when I was working on a project outside for a while, I noticed an unpleasant smell. When I stopped working, about an hour later the smell got worse, I guess it was because I was less distracted. Then it stuck around and only subsided this morning. No one else could smell it. I have had it happen before, it is fairly rare and it is also random. It could be any smell, some smells but not others and different types of smell, unusual, pleasant or unpleasant. It is like the smells stick around in my nose and take ages to go away.

On the bright side, at least I now know the smell probably isn't coming from me!

 

[Gerald Wilgus]

I do that with taste and have a long memory. That has helped me when I cook as except for some exotic flavors I can deconstruct the spices. But for something like Durian, I could still conjure up the smell and flavor of it.

 

[Mary Terry]

There is a pet food factory near the highway on the way to the city where I usually shop. When I was pregnant, the smell of the pet food cooking at the plant would make me start gagging. Every time I was pregnant, I had to drive a circuitous route to avoid the smell. I can still smell it when the plant is cooking a batch of whatever meat they use for dog and cat food, and it always reminds me of how awful it was back in those days.

 

[Magna]

I don't have olfactory hallucinations but when you say "smell flashbacks" I take that to mean smelling something that vividly reminds you of that similar smell from the past. My most intense experience of this instantly brought back memories of more than thirty years prior:

I went to Catholic grade school and back then every weekday began with morning Mass. The priest was from Ireland and when he'd dispense with Communion the hosts always had a distinctive smell to them that were unique. I didn't give that much of any thought when I was a child and must have just assumed that's how the hosts smelled.

Thirty years later I developed an interest in wet shaving (ie using a mug, brush and shaving soap). I bought a shaving soap I'd never tried before from the UK known as: Mitchell's Wool Fat ("wool fat" = lanolin). Literally the instant that I smelled the shave soap from the packaging it was as though I was hit by a lightning bolt of memories and in that instant I realized that the smell all those years ago, all those mornings during Masses, was the smell of Mitchell's Wool Fat. The priest had used Mitchell's Wool Fat soap exclusively. The smell gave me a "smell flashback" instantly and powerfully to my childhood resulting in the strongest "smell flashback" I've ever had.

 

[Tyer]

Very calming to know that others have that too.
(People around me always looked at me as if Im crazy, when I talked about that.)
I had "smell halluzinations" since im little.
Sometimes there are moments where my brain just repeats and reapeats a smell from the past.
Just random. Out of the blue, or how its called.
Remembering it over and over again.
Almost burning it in my skull.

Im pretty sure that its connected to 'very active neurons' that shoot and repeat the signals over and over again. because it seems autistic brains have pretty often those "firework"-like activity.
Or at least it feels like it does. (Im sorry if it isnt correct or if its incomplete. Explaining exactly everything, would be too much, for something thats just an vage "idea".)
(in short: I think our brains just cant chill sometimes. And react to the slightest things and sometimes even on their own. And do the same like a hiccup and sometimes it takes way too long to stop.)

 

[Tom]

Yes I get that too. I never knew if it was my imagination or some small residue that I was just very sensitive to.

 

[Judge]

Lots of possible explanations...

https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/322698#symptoms

 

[MC1Rcat]

I can have smells linger for a couple days sometimes, especially if I sit in a cab where the previous fare had on a lot of perfume. It drives me nuts, because I will think the smell must still be on my coat or bag the next day....but often it is not. I also hallucinate smells that no one else around me can perceive....like car exhaust (that is a migraine aura for me) or other things that usually smell bad. It happens off and on, migraine or not. When I was 6 and 7 years old I used to have frequent nightmares of smelling burning wood in my room, and would refuse to sleep in there. No clue what that was from, but thankfully my mom was always patient with me . I also have a strong memory recall of smells from childhood. For example, anytime I smell someone chewing Juicy Fruit gum, I remember one of my grandfathers so vividly, its as if he is standing next to me.

 

[Jumpinbare]

Lots of possible explanations...

https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/322698#symptoms

Well, that article is encouraging! [sarcasm] Siezure, schizophrenia, tumor, etc. No mention of autism as a possible cause. Although it mentions brain abnormalities, and our brains ARE supposed to be different. My narcolepsy occasionally causes visual and audible hallucinations, but these are associated with going into REM sleep at inappropriate times and are pretty random. These persistent smells for me need a trigger of actually experiencing the smell first, then they "hiccup" back as @Tyer mentioned.

 

[Judge]

Well, that article is encouraging! [sarcasm] Siezure, schizophrenia, tumor, etc. No mention of autism as a possible cause. Although it mentions brain abnormalities, and our brains ARE supposed to be different. My narcolepsy occasionally causes visual and audible hallucinations, but these are associated with going into REM sleep at inappropriate times and are pretty random. These persistent smells for me need a trigger of actually experiencing the smell first, then they "hiccup" back as @Tyer mentioned.

My own such olfactory experience was not listed under so many pathological explanations.

More inline with hypnopompic hallucinations where infrequently I smell cigarette smoke as I emerge from REM sleep. Yet there is utterly not actual exposure to cigarette smoke, which I am morbidly allergic to. Not to mention that such smoke does not instantly dissipate in sync with coming out of a dream state.

Making me wonder at times whether this could be a paranormal experience...even what some refer to as a "visitation". Yet if that is not the case, why is it ALWAYS only this one particular kind of smell, which never seems to change and continues to come back, but on an infrequent, semi-conscious basis ? Very strange....

 

[Tyer]

My own such olfactory experience was not listed under so many pathological explanations.

More inline with hypnopompic hallucinations where infrequently I smell cigarette smoke as I emerge from REM sleep. Yet there is utterly not actual exposure to cigarette smoke, which I am morbidly allergic to. Not to mention that such smoke does not instantly dissipate in sync with coming out of a dream state.

Making me wonder at times whether this could be a paranormal experience...even what some refer to as a "visitation". Yet if that is not the case, why is it ALWAYS only this one particular kind of smell, which never seems to change and continues to come back, but on an infrequent, semi-conscious basis ? Very strange....

My guess is that some brain pattern, while waking up, triggers the memory of that smell for some reason. The signals...or neuronal links are somehow wired or "learned" to repeat them.

I dont know, maybe a family member smoked in the morning in your childhood. Or something connected to a barbeque party.
But that doesnt need to be the case.
It can also just be random "firework" in the brain.

(Warning: the following is meant to be not taken serious!]
Or a Ghost starres at you, smoking, until you wake up.
[And a more heartwarming version]
Any dead people who loved you dear? Checking up on you, to see, if youre safe and feeling good.
Makes one feel loved.
...exept that cigarett smoke isnt really a favorite smell...

 

[Judge]

Any dead people who loved you dear? Checking up on you, to see, if youre safe and feeling good.
Makes one feel loved.
...exept that cigarett smoke isnt really a favorite smell...

Indeed, but what an unmistakable way of letting you know they were there. And that in this one and only case where the smoke is noticeable, yet doesn't bother me.

My mother smoked her entire adult life.