My stroke beat me up pretty good, physically speaking, and it took a while to get used to my new way of life. Most of my motor skills are pretty much shot and the entire left side of my body is basically numb, but one thing it didn’t touch at all and left it working perfectly was my sense of smell. However (hate that word), I can’t “take a big whiff” of something because I can’t voluntarily inhale deeply. But once outside air enters my nose through regular (shallow) breathing, I can smell any odors in it just fine. (Sidenote: I’ve often wondered about this – My stroke pretty much wiped out almost all my motor skills and most of my sense of touch is greatly diminished, but my important internal organs (heart, lungs, liver, etc.) were left alone to function normally, allowing me to survive. Dr. Zazulia, if you happen to be reading this, will you give me the “what for” about this sometime?)

Anyway, back to smelling things, since my nose still worked okay, I leaned in pretty hard into creating a pleasant-smelling environment for myself. It’s all about grabbing as much independence as you can and hanging on to some control over your surroundings these days. So about 8-10 years ago I bought a diffuser for myself and a few fragrance oils (pictured below). The way it works: put a few drops of fragrance oil along with some water (¼c. – ½c.) in its reservoir and switch it on. It puts out a fine mist that (usually) smells great. I like scented candles too (not too ashamed to admit that) but this thing is much safer: Open flame + Locked-in Syndrome = Recipe for disaster. Before long, the whole room smells like a yoga studio or a wellness clinic where they serve fresh cucumber water to the customers in the waiting room (‘Um, we don’t think of them as “customers”, we prefer thinking of them as “partners in wellness”’, ‘Whatever. I hate working here anyway.’)

The first one I got was all wood, that’s why I named it “Woody”, and it looked really cool (as cool as a diffuser can look, I guess.) But somebody knocked it onto our tile floor (don’t look at me) and it was broken and was rendered useless. So, its replacement was a white, all plastic model that is much more durable (and much less attractive, in my view.) We named the new one “Whitey” after the much-beloved gangster/killer/crime boss Whitey Bulger (I’m kidding, he was a horrible person. BTW, the Johnny Depp movie “Black Mass” about his life was great.) Anyway, the name “Whitey” didn’t stick for whatever reason so went back to using the name “Woody”, not to be confused with “Wooly”, just to keep things relatively simple. It’s been perfectly harmonious ever since.

After my collection of little brown bottles of fragrance oils started piling up, it was getting harder and harder to keep it all straight in my head and remembering what I had. So, I created a database for them on my computer and assigned each one a unique ID number (1=”Aloha”, 2=”Alpine Snow”, 3=”Amish Bread”, etc.) Now they’re all organized, safely stored away and easily retrievable!  On days when we’re gonna be home in the afternoon and I’m going to use one, I run a SQL query against that database to randomly select that day’s SotD (Scent of the Day). It’s all about minimizing the number of decisions I have to make in a day. Yes, I know, big-time nerd – guilty as charged😊.

Both Jen and I get headaches fairly frequently. Mine usually occur in the Spring during allergy season, when pollen is high. I take Claritin during that time and that seems to prevent them pretty well from coming on in the first place. They aren’t that bad anyway, Excedrin and/or Motrin usually do the trick. Jen’s, though, are a lot worse. She gets year-round migraines a few times a month. They’re not so severe that she has to lay down in a darkened bedroom with a damp washcloth on her forehead all day long, but they’re bad enough. She takes Imitrex for them and that works like a charm, but the side effects can be kinda intense. We found that fragrances with a strong flowery smell can trigger headaches for both of us. So,  scents like “Gardenia” and “Plumeria” are a no-go. I need to stick with the more “manly” fragrances like “Campfire”, “Cedarwood”, “Forest Pine” and the ever popular, “Dirt”.

I will be out of the office all next week for Spring Break, see you in 2 weeks when I return from my Florida beach vacation!  For assistance, please contact my colleague Jennifer Biggs at: (314) 555-4422. If this is an emergency, hang up the phone and dial 911.

Psst, riechst du etwas?

– Jim