I Can't Smell But I Can Hear

Once in a very great while I struggle with my taste and smell issues, but usually not for very long.  Especially now that I am finding things that I think taste good when I eat them.  I just don't think about it.  I push the "oh, I will never smell that again" out of my mind for the most part, or else, take a little time to smell in my brain and think how I appreciated what I could smell back then.  Another good exercise is to remember some others who are struggling with far worse issues than no smelling. 

Actually, I do smell a little bit, but the kind of smelling this is, so the doctors say, is a chemical reaction in the brand not a stimulation of the olfactory nerve which makes a true smell.  For example, kleenex has a smell, and so does the inside of my nose once in a while.  Ammonia is another "smell", maybe I should say odor, that really isn't a smell at all. It's the chemical reaction thingy again.  And I can smell that for sure.

Anyway, about the hearing bit.  I went in this afternoon to have the ENT doctor evaluate my ears and hopefully put tubes in to relieve the pressure from the fluid behind my ear drums.  My Omaha doctor recommended this after three months of no improvement and  my hearing was getting worse.  

In fact,  it was so bad these two weeks I couldn't hear Jim when he was sitting next to be at the table speaking in a normal tone of voice.  So after a hearing test to make sure the nerves weren't damaged, I had the tubes put in right there in the office.  It isn't exactly a pleasant experience either.  Although, I've had plenty of worse ones.  I am getting a bit tired of being poked around on.  The ear drum is numbed before the put the tube in, but in order to numb it, well....that part hurts.  The 10 seconds or so they took to put the numbing medicine in took a long time, and I wasn't so keen to have it done the second time.  

But, as soon as the fluid was suctioned out and the tube in, I could tell a big difference.  It was no longer like listening to people through a fog,  

 I wondered when I got home how much hearing normal things would bother me.  They don't bother me, but it is like,,,"oh, I hear the refrigerator running", and my skirt swishing, and...did you know toilet paper makes a noise when you handle it?  Well, it does.  

It is really nice to hear people when they are talking a room away.  I just hope my Eustachian tubes decide to open back up again after awhile, although we were just informed that this is very normal after radiation and they may or may not open up again. Errrgh.  

I wonder how many more surprises there are in store.