Your Dying Spouse 200 - The Nose Knows

Wow...two hundred posts in this series. That's kind of a milestone.

Caregivers, this is going to be hard for you to hear...but what you smell like can really make a difference in the life of the person for whom you're caring. For good, of for bad.

I'm not going to address common, basic hygiene. I assume you're all there, and not washing once a month or so.

Nope. This is about what you eat. You aren't what you eat, but you do smell like it. And you likely don't know it.

The biggest culprits are garlic, onions, and alcohol. The body looks at these as being, at least in part, as toxins, and tries to flush them out as quickly as possible...and that means through the pores as well as the usual paths.

Not that these three 'foods' are bad for you...not even alcohol, which is quite beneficial in moderation. (During WW2, citizens were asked to donate blood every week, and to drink red wine between donations. And if you live in France and don't have wine with each meal, your neighbours will think you quite mad.)

Where was I?

Oh, right. The foods may be beneficial, the body may be over-reacting, and it may all be innocuous, except that you might smell pretty bad, at least to someone who's fighting nausea and loss of appetite anyway.

Aside from making your caregiving an uncomfortable experience, it can also build a kind of distance, if you're not careful. Physical revulsion (and that is not too strong a term, believe me) brought on by illness can lead to an emotional wariness. Part of it is a natural outgrowth and is subconscious, but part may be "he/she knows I'm sick and nauseated, and should know that I can't take this Mediterranean diet stuff!"

And the patient for whom you're caring may well be too polite, or too proud to tell you.

So...for what it's worth, here''s my advice - if you're caregiving for your spouse, ask: "Does what I eat make me smell...uncomfortable...to you?"

Believe me, this kind of gracious approach can do wonders for your relationship...and for the quality of time together you may yet have.

Marley update...he's received a lot of support, but STILL NEEDS HELP TO BE SAVED.

WE ARE MAKING A DIFFERENCE!

He's up to nearly 200,000 signatures, but the local authorities are dragging their feet. They think that we'll give up and go away. We won't.

If you have a mment, I'd like to ask you to visit Change.org to consider a petition to free a 'death row dog' who has been separated from his family for ten months over a misunderstanding. Marley was saved from Afghanistan by a US serviceman; please help make sure this story doesn't end in needless tragedy! Marley's gotten a lot of support...but he still needs our help.

If you can, please do leave a comment. I am trying to answer all, and I am failing, but please know this - I read and treasure each one.

Below are my recent releases on Kindle -please excuse their presence in the body of the blog. I haven't the energy to get them up as 'buttons' in the sidebar. You can click on the covers to go to the Amazon links.