increased sense of smell after removing mask in morning

[amandat]

Is this normal? I wake up and smell things ive never smelled in my bedroom before. Trippiest thing ever.

[palerider]

Is this normal? I wake up and smell things ive never smelled in my bedroom before. Trippiest thing ever.

yes. you're breathing slightly filtered air, and also if you have any perfumes in your bedclothes or shampoo or any kind of cosmetics, the scents are going to be weaker whereever the cpap intake is as opposed to where your nose is.

after you smell something for a while, your nose sort of becomes 'numb' to that smell and you don't notice it so much, breathing air from a distance for several hours lets your nose sort of 'forget' those scents, so when you unmask, the nose goes "oh! something new!"

[Krelvin]

Happens every time I take off the mask.... normal for me.

[But it's me!]

My first post after a month's worth of CPAP and plenty of lurking!

I have noticed this too. Rather enjoy it, especially since using drops of lavender oil to scent the bedroom. There is a downside to this however, when I woke to foul breath one morning (using a FFM).

Thanks

[chunkyfrog]

Numb nose, a phenomenon for which a coroner can be grateful!

[RicaLynn]

Recall also that once you find the right humidity level, the CPAP can actually clear your nasal passages, making your sense of smell a bit more keen overall

[PlinkerCraig]

Been using CPAP now for only three weeks, and after a few days I remember telling my wife the same thing about having an enhanced sense of smell right after taking the mask off.

[Guest]

Our sense of smell often serves to warn us of dangers or dinner time but then the smell lingers too long the brain blocks it out and we can no longer smell it. Think about the ladies and their perfume or if you ever smoked how you could never smell the smoke in your clothes or hair, yet others around you could; or after you stopped how sensitive your nose was to smoke anywhere.

So now with the cpap you are breathing filtered air without all of the particulates and contaminants for several hours when you put the cpap on. Then in the morning when you take the mask off there is that sudden change in smells your brain wants to warn you of. Some smell baby power or some other perfumed scent, I smelled dust and my nose would run likely from the contaminants now in the air.

I don't remember how long this lasted for me but I no longer smell dust when I remove the mask in the morning.

Btw - taste and smell go together. When you have a cold and the nose is stuffed food doesn't taste so good does it?

[amandat]

Oh my gosh! Im a baby powder smeller. That's so funny that I'm not the only one who smells that particular scent . Thanks all for the replies! This is super interesting.

[archangle]

I find that CPAP pressure clears out my nose. If I'm suffering stuffy nose, sometimes CPAP will clear it up. Some of this may be the mechanical pressure on the tissue causing it to shrink.

I think there may be some more complicated and subtle reasons for an enhanced sense of smell with CPAP. There are lots of complicated feedback and other processes involved with the nose and smell.

The important thing is that many of us do notice a more sensitive sense of smell while on CPAP. Some people even get what might be called "olfactory hallucinations" where we smell some scent that isn't really there.

[Captain_Midnight]

My suspicion? Untreated OSA leads to chronic local and systemic inflammation.

With xpappian therapy, inflammation subsides, so can the related neuropathy.

You may notice improvement of other OSA sequelae as well.

.

[goodland@earthlink.net]

Been using CPAP for 6 years. This year I began noticing increased and annoying smells, mostly stemming from being near chemicals. Deodorants, perfumes, darkroom chemicals, some cleansers. Once I smell it, it seems to stick around for hours, lingering in the ol' olfactory membranes, or brain receptors (?). The smell or sense of it doesn't go away even when the object does. It's not pleasant. I had kidney cancer in 2014 with cryoablation surgery, and am supposedly okay now. I wonder if this heightened smell sensitivity might be due to: the CPAP therapy (also had a monster nosebleed a few months ago), cancer, cryoablation (argon gas). Anybody have any information on CPAP causing thinning of the nose membranes enough to affect our sense of smell? Very strange phenomena.. thanks.

[Julie]

There's another very similar thread "Heightened..." a few threads below this one - take a look...

[IDontSnoreISwear]

Is this normal? I wake up and smell things ive never smelled in my bedroom before. Trippiest thing ever.

Yep, every day. My mattress (which was just purchased in September) still has that new-memory-foam smell... Bleh.