Everything tastes like nothing, but they each taste like a slightly different nothing.
The symptoms for MY Corona Virus have been relatively mild. I know that it reacts differently to everyone so I am nothing but grateful for how it has chosen to attack my body.
The biggest symptom I have had so far is the lack to taste and smell. I have been presented with all sorts of questions and comments about what it must be like.
"You must have a basic smell. You can't just smell nothing."
"Try eating things you absolutely hate!"
"So, like, if something doesn't taste, then what is it?"
While I struggled to answer these questions a few days ago, I have been experimenting with different things in order to fully attempt to understand my new-found super power. Anti-super power? Can I use this for good? I bet you I could.
I will show up to the dinner tables of young children who refuse to eat their vegetables and help them finish. Even if their parents simply don't know how to cook them, it won't affect me too much, will it? I will be loved by children the world over!
But, anyways, back to the point. WHAT THE HELL DO THINGS TASTE LIKE?!
Things kind of have a taste. But I'm pretty sure the only reason I think that is because, most of the things I've been eating, I already know what they're supposed to taste like. But what it all comes down to is textures. Have you ever heard about when people don't have sight, so their hearing amplifies? It's a similar concept.
The loss of taste started with a seafood mac and cheese. The mac had shrimp and crab in it and the crazy thing was that shrimp has such a distinct texture to it, so I knew for sure that it was shrimp in my mouth, but I couldn't taste the shrimp flavor. I didn't explore into it too much at that moment, since, you know, I was kind of freaking out. But since then. I have been doing some experimenting.
These experiments started with a Spicy Ramen Noodle soup. I am an absolute pansy when it comes to anything spicy, but I figured now would be a good time to try it out. I know a woman back home who had the virus back in April (i think) and she has been having to eat and drink stronger flavored things because that's the only way she gets any sensation.
Of course, like almost anyone, the second I pulled the bowl out of the microwave I tried to smell it, forgetting that I have lost that luxury. Well, fine then. I'll just dive right in.
I don't think I can explain how crazy it is to eat something without smelling it first. You never think about how important that is, but you also don't have to THINK about smelling something. You just do. When someone hands you a shot at a bar, what's the first thing you do? You smell it! And then everyone yells at you that you're not supposed to smell a shot before you take it. It happens literally every time.
So, here I am, about to eat spicy ramen, something I've never had before, without smelling it and also without being able to taste it. Let's run it.
So here's the crazy thing. While eating the ramen, I can tell it's spicy. I can feel the heat all throughout my mouth and in my throat, but there is no actual flavor! I eat a lot of hot wing sauces while at work and I know the difference between spice and flavor. I could feel my mind trying to fill in the blanks with certain peppery tastes and vinegar, but upon further examination, I discovered that it was just an illusion.
Given the amount of spice in the ramen, I tried REALLY hard to smell it. I thought it was absolutely crazy that I couldn't smell anything. Well, I was smelling to no avail. However, if I smelled hard enough (never thought I would have to smell as hard as I could) I could feel the spice in the back of my throat. It was the same tingly feeling that you would normally feel in your nose, but it's just in the very back of my throat.
The ramen was easy to get through because it's all one thing. Well, two things: broth and noodles. The two other soups that I ate, proved to me much more difficult. When I embarked on a lunch with many more elements, THAT is when i could really be sure that I wasn't make this shit up. (There was a moment where I was like....can I really not taste or am I making this up?)
When you're eating soup, especially soup with a creamy broth, everything is covered and the only way you can tell what exactly is in your mouth is by pairing the textures with the flavors. And I only have one of those sensations to go off of.
While shopping early last week, I had purchased some soups. I was debating between the expensive Panera soups and the off-brand much cheaper soups. I'm not super picky (haha, SOUPer picky), so I chose the cheaper option. I warmed up the loaded potato soup that night and, I'm not gonna lie to you, it wasn't very good. But, guess what? I have no sense of taste! And if that's true, this soup will be delicious..or..just not bad, I guess.
I was correct. It wasn't bad at all. It wasn't really anything. It's hard to explain what "nothing" tastes like. I can closely describe it the taste of water or trying to describe what water tastes like. There are different brands of water and each one has different distinct taste factors even though they are all water. I feel like that's how this food is. Everything tastes like nothing, but they each taste like a slightly different nothing.
Because I couldn't taste it, I was much more perceptive to the textures within the soup. I was picking out the bacon, potato, strings of cheese and kind of just guessing as to what they were. The cool thing was, once I picked out what they were, I was able to assign to taste to them and have a small taste sensation that I then pushed away because I questioned it. Once I questioned if I was imagining the taste or actually tasting it, it all went away. I went through the same experience with the broccoli cheddar soup of the same brand.
The thing that really threw me off was when I drank a soda, the wrong soda. Up until that point, I had been drinking some Mt. Dew (imagine that) and the only real taste out of it was the carbonation sensation. I had poured it on ice so I could tell when it was getting watered-down simply based off of that lack of carbonation. I tried to think that I could actually taste it, but it all just tasted like that watery-nothing I talked about earlier.
Wednesday night, one of the trainers, still staying in the hotel, ordered food and was nice enough to include me in her order! So I ordered a chicken salad with balsamic vinaigrette with added guac and fountain coke. After I placed the order, I wasn't totally sure why I ordered a coke but I thought it would be a good test. And, mentally, I'll know I'm not drinking the same damn thing all the time. And before you say anything, I have been drinking LOTS of water during all of this as well.
My dinner arrived and while they remembered the guac, they replaced my balsamic with honey mustard. Fun fact - I HATE mustard. So here is the big test. My mother kept telling me to try things that I hate, so I think she wished this upon me. In my anger at my mothers wish coming true, I took a drink of my soda.
Which was....weird. I got what I thought was Coca-Cola but it..had a weird tinge to it. Kind of a taste, but not necessarily. It was like an aftertaste, if you can call it that without a taste in the first place. My initial thought was that it was not Coke. Maybe Dr. Pepper? I couldn't quite place it and, for a moment, I was annoyed because I would never truly know what it was. Until I got smart for a moment and checked the lid which was labeled DIET COKE!
Oh my gosh, I knew it! Well I didn't. like....know it, but I knew it. So, knowing that it is diet, I could taste the tinge that differentiates a diet soda from a regular soda. And it was that tinge that I was relating with Dr. Pepper for some reason. And I know that you know what I'm talking about, because we all have drank one either on purpose or on accident, so you know that weird, sweet, tinge, that it leaves in your mouth. Tinge is the only word I can come up with to describe it, so if you have a better one, please let me know! Oh yeah, and that honey mustard..just fine. Didn't even notice.
The other thing I think is strange is that salt gives me the tingles in my mouth. When I first tried it, I thought I was tasting it. That seemed okay to me because of how strong and singular it is. However, while writing this, I have been trying it again to get a real feel for it. I have come to the conclusion that I don't know if I'm tasting it so much as feeling it. The tingles get all tingly and then I get most of the sensation when I swallow it and it hits the back of my throat.
I tried eating pepper and I got nothing. No sensation, no tingles. Nothing. And then, because I'm going all out in my research, I tried to sniff the pepper to see if I will sneeze. I know it's not freshly ground pepper, but I was sure, with enough, it would have the same reaction. So uhh..I ingested a lot of pepper, with not even a hint of a sneeze. Pepper contains an alkaloid of pyridine called piperine. It's this alkaloid that stimulates, pretty much irritates the nerve endings inside the mucous membrane and that's what causes you to sneeze. So, the virus must have an affect on membranes or the nerve endings themselves. But I'm not a doctor, don't quote me. That's 100% an uneducated guess.
In conclusion, this sucks. Somehow I have been eating a lot more than most people have been while they have....I just sneezed..probably from that pepper from five minutes ago. It finally caught up with me. So maybe disregard all of that. Or don't. I don't know, again, not a doctor.
But yeah, I've been eating a lot more than most people do while they have COVID. My Angel told me that some people have found that foods they usually eat all of the sudden taste terrible. And I haven't ran into yet, and hopefully I don't, because that sounds awful.
I've been learning that textures and sensations are a bigger thing than I ever thought before. It's something that we never have to think about. It's like breathing, which I'm learning about today, to be for another blog. But, when you have nothing else to focus on other than the sensations you get and the textures that foods hold, it's a whole new world. I'm mainly curious to see how I am going to taste once things return. Am I still going to notice how everything FEELS too? Or will I just be so excited to actually have flavors in my mouth again?
I'm just hoping I find that out soon.
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