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Olfactory training is the main approach that helps many people regain their sense of smell after long COVID. It's straightforward: several times a day you smell strongly scented substances (like essential oils of lemon, rose, clove, eucalyptus) and try to concentrate on the smell, to really picture it. You do this systematically, for weeks and months. Research shows that this kind of training actually works - your sense of smell gradually comes back, especially if you start early 🧴
At the same time, it's worth taking care of your overall health: get good sleep, eat plenty of vitamins (especially C and A), drink enough water. For some people, nasal rinses with saline solutions help - they improve the condition of your mucous membranes. And here's something interesting about spicy food - the heat you feel isn't from your sense of smell, but from the trigeminal nerve, so spicy dishes can create an illusion of taste and help your brain "remember" its sense of smell.
If after a few months of training there's no improvement at all, it's worth seeing an ENT doctor. Sometimes the problem isn't just with your sense of smell itself, but with nasal congestion or other complications that a doctor can identify and help you address.
After COVID, my sense of smell took about six months to come back, and yeah, training helped, but the key thing is not to get hung up on the results and not expect miracles in a week. People often give up after two weeks because they don't see progress, and then they're surprised that nothing came back. An important point that not many people mention: sometimes recovery goes in waves - like you feel better for a week, then you backslide again, and that's completely normal, doesn't mean you're doing something wrong. Also worth keeping an eye on zinc and B vitamin deficiencies - your sense of smell responds to those, especially if your body's weakened from the illness.
Have you been recovering for a while now or is it just starting?
I've heard from people I know that it really does work, but only if you stick with it. One of my neighbors spent three months smelling cinnamon, lemon, coffee - and it gradually came back. Another woman told me that cooking helped her: she'd chop onions, garlic, fry vegetables - and at some point she started noticing smells, even though she wasn't actively training.
The thing is, it seems like this doesn't happen fast or in a straight line. Someone might feel nothing for two weeks, then suddenly notice some smell, then nothing again. If you're waiting for a miracle to happen in a few days - you'll get disappointed and give up. But if you understand this is going to take months, it's easier to handle those ups and downs mentally. Either way, I'd still recommend seeing an ENT to rule out complications - sometimes the sense of smell doesn't come back because of those, not just because of inflammation.
I have a friend who spent a year and a half recovering her sense of smell, and her doctor told her that besides smell training, it's important to monitor inflammation in the nose - she'd rinse with saline solutions and take B vitamins, which help nerve fibers recover. Maybe it's worth not just working with scents, but also keeping the mucous membrane in good condition overall.
If you've been doing self-training for several months with no results, it's worth checking with a doctor to see exactly what happened to your receptors. Sometimes vitamin therapy helps (especially zinc and B vitamins), and sometimes you need anti-inflammatory nasal sprays so there's actually something to recover.
The main tip for the training itself is to switch up your scents every other day instead of using the same ones all the time. Your olfactory system adapts quickly, and you'll just stop noticing the smell. Try four or five different scents and rotate them: Monday through Wednesday one, Thursday through Saturday another, and Sunday a third one.
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