I’m willing to accept that some people have poor oral hygiene or I’m talking to people at that unfortunate time after they’ve had a caramel mochiato and cigarette, but lately I seem to encounter more and more people whose breath I find unpleasant when I talk to them. Is it possible that I’ve got some kind of extra sensitive nose that picks this up more than most people? Or is this just bad luck?
Who are you hanging out with? How close are you getting to them? Most adults have bad breath to me because of poor oral hygiene and ubiquitous gum disease. However, it isn’t noticeable from a distance for most people. Some people really are super-smellers and their definition of bad breath can mean anything from a bacterial smell to food smells. Some people say that foods like garlic and Indian spices give people bad breath. I never thought so. It is strong but it smells like the spice and is preferable to rot mouth. Cigarette’s are about the same.
What smells are you detecting?
Some are friends of mine, some are people I work with, some are randoms. I was at a bar with a friend at the weekend and a girl in a sexy xmas dress was walking around selling shots to people. Such a job depends on people finding you attractive so as to make them more likely to purchase what you’re selling (shots, cigarettes, whatever) but her breath smelt. Not overpowering, but it definitely was off, like off milk. A guy I work with has something similar, but a little less powerful. I’ve mentioned on this board before a friend of mine who has breath that I’d expect to come out of a dog’s mouth.
I wonder, Illumin, if you and I are going through something similar. A couple years ago I started smelling smells around the home. Not all the time and not really bad, but there. I assumed it was cat litter and such and would clean everything out.
Finally I started doubting my sense of smell. I would smell the same smell at work at times. I tried to verify the smell with others and they could never smell it.
Again, not often, but enough to be troubling. So I did a web search and was not comforted with what I found. For example:
http://bodyodd.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2009/11/10/4380036-phantom-smells-may-be-a-sign-of-trouble
I still have it from time to time but I watch it. If it gets worse I will off to a doctor like a cannon shot.
Probably nothing related to you…but maybe so I thought I would bring it up.
Hate to say this but it might be your own breath/B.O. you are smelling?
Thanks - that’s quite a useful one to know. I’m pretty certain it’s not an imaginary smell but it’s so consistent, for example friend with dog breath has it virtually every time I talk to her, so I’m clear there is something there.
I have considered that, but I’m so anal about my own oral hygiene I think that’s not possible. Also, again, I smell it consistently coming off certain people’s breaths but not others, so the common factor is them not me.
Yep.
One day the significant other is sitting there and complains of faint smell she doesn’t like. Well, for various reasons our house IS kinda stinky. And my sense of smell aint so hot, so I believe her but given it doesnt seem to be a big deal neither of us investigate further. Awhile later she goes to clean the dust off the ceiling fan blades. She starts wondering about this loud squeaking sound she gets doing it. Well, I can tell there is NO such sound. Now I know something aint right (and I have an idea of what) so its rush to the emergency room.
Unlike usual visits to the ER, they rush us right in. Give her some various meds right then they give people with strokes and the like. Turns out out she had a TIA. No apparent long term damage but certainly something that needed immediate attention.
Back to the OP. I’ve known a couple of people that I suspect have good oral hygeine and still have some serious bad breath.
I’d recommend a trip to the dentist, and a referral to an ENT specialist. You could have an abscess somewhere that is hijacking your olfactory system.
But the first trip you need to take is to your primary care doctor.
~VOW
Very true; there are medical conditions which can cause strange breath odors, which no amount of oral hygiene can cover. When I was an undiagnosed and uncontrolled diabetic, my breath developed a funky odor; once the diabetes was brought under control, the breath cleared up.
That said, if the OP is suddenly noticing a lot of people with bad breath, when he didn’t notice this before, it certainly suggests to me that the issue may be on his end.
It’s been going on for a while, it’s not a sudden or new thing. I’ve always had a particular intolerance for bad breath and I’ve not had a stroke or aneurysm yet.
It could just be that you have become more sensitive to smells. I have sat at my desk for 3 years, but in the last month I have really started to notice the cigarette odour from the lady opposite. I never noticed it before, but now I can smell it as soon as she sits down, and whenever she returns from a break. I don’t understand why I am more sensitive to it, but I am.
And don’t get me started on the guys at work with bad breath…
There’s also the time of day factor. If I smell my breath (hand in front of mouth direct airflow to nose) I can tell it’s not as minty fresh after 4 PM as it was in the AM. If I go without eating for a while well into the evening it can also get pretty potent. Oddly eating and drinking seems to emiminate the issue. Going for a while on an empty stomach can make your breath rank.
Yes I try and bear that in mind - the reason your breath isn’t so fresh in the day is because it’s gone stale (bacteria growing on the residue from that last cup of coffee). When you have a proper meal or something substantial to drink it flushes your mouth out. Even more reason to try and get people to eat when you’re with them! The problem is when someone with bad breath orders wine - aaaaaaaaaaaaaaargh!
Are you in the States? A lot of us have trouble affording good dental care, and gum disease is endemic.
Reading the OP, is it just everyone’s breath? I notice that too; but also unwashed garments, the oil in the part of their hair, etc.
At least it’s not olfactory hallucination. George Gershwin smelled burnt rubber right before he died of a brain tumor. Anthony Burgess, with his nose crippled by tobacco since childhood, told his doctor (4-minute miler Roger Bannister) he smelled pencil shavings, when he probably couldn’t smell anything; and was misdiagnosed as terminal
I’m in the UK so shouldn’t be lack of affordable dentistry, and certainly not with my friends/colleagues as we’re in the income bracket that can definitely afford it.
No, it’s not everyone, just some people.
first of all, the reason one cannot smell their own breath odor is due to a phenomenon called olfactory fatigue. So if you can’t smell your own breath odor, then you won’t be able to smell similar breath odor on other people as well. Here’s what i am thinking:the more funky your breath is, the less funky everybody else’s breath is going to be to you. And vice versa. When i was younger and had worse oral hygiene, I could smell other people’s breath, but the bad breath epidemic didn’t seem as pervasive as it is nowadays. I brush my tongue and take a water pik to clean out my tonsils, and eat a higher percentage of raw fruits and vegetables in my diet than I did back in the day. So now i have the same problem you do, which it seems like everybody has varying degrees and varieties of breath odor, and some breath odors I don’t ever remember smelling until recently, and now I smell those odors on a fairly common basis.
Well, you come in and stir something up that’s been dead for five years, of course it’s going smell bad.
Somewhere, possibly on another board, there’s somebody writing a complaint which goes a little like - - -