This week I realized that it is unlikely that my youngest can smell...anything. (Even though we can all certainly smell him!) It dawned on me when I was reading about someone else's child being sensitive to smell and I realized G has never told us anything stinks or smells good. His vision is super strong, he can see things very far away that no one else even notices. Exact opposite of myself and his older brother and sister who can't see far without glasses. His hearing is also super sensitive. He can't stand loud noises and will unplug the vacuum if you pause to move things out of the way. Thankfully he doesn't do this while the vacuum is running...but he will run into the other room. I remember earlier this year we were at the store and they had fresh flowers and I was trying to get him to smell them and when he did he seemed to blow air out not in. He now does that when I ask him to smell other things. I hadn't thought to ask him about smells again until recently.
The other night after I realized this I did various smells on napkins or right from the bottle since he cannot read. Garlic salt, onion powder, vinegar, vanilla, lemon, butternut, cinnamon, nail polish remover, rubbing alcohol. None of them had any impact. He smelled the vinegar twice until his older brother said ewe nasty so then he started saying this as well. He smelled nail polish remover right from the bottle, nose as close as he could get and no reaction. He tried 3 times. Is he just good at ignoring smells or does he just not smell anything? Hes still not great at communicating and as much as I have tried to describe smelling with his nose I don't think he understands. When I would ask him what things smelled like he would say basketball game, doctor appointment and once pop tart. Not cookie, pancake, or medicine like one would expect.
This really has me wondering about the connection to or through hypotonia and his failure to thrive (FTT) issue. If he really and truly has no sense of smell this could be part of the reason he avoids certain foods. I have been trying to search for what things taste like to a person without ability to smell but have only read a few things. One he won't drink anything but milk, or vanilla milk. Juice he has always refused. This could be because without smell the juice may just taste acidic and not sweet like everyone else tastes. This may be the same case for fruits and veggies. It may be the texture bothers him because the taste is off? Not sure but would make a lot of sense...pun intended.
I am going to be trying to get him to smell things for the next couple weeks, although he is already annoyed with me. If he cannot smell I must seem insane to him, always sticking something in his face. Hope I don't give him a complex. I have asked around and other moms have told me their kids don't seem to smell anything either. Then again they probably aren't crazy like me and shoving stuff in their kids faces saying whats this smell like?
I don't think there is anything to be done to fix it if he doesn't smell but it may be a clue to find out what he has or what is wrong with him. He has a few upcoming appointments, ENT (Which works out perfect for questions and testing), genetics (may help them find a diagnosis) and before those appointments we have an appointment with an encopresis clinic specialist. Not sure if that is their forte, wrong end of the body but won't hurt to mention it?
Like always onward and forward to find answers.
No comments:
Post a Comment