constantly smell cigarette smoke

[gcmx]

I have been experiencing the same thing for about a week or so--smell cigarette smoke when no smoke exists. Thought it was coming from the AC vent in my office but then started smelling it in car and at home. The strange thing is that when I inhale, sometimes the odor is so real I feel my eyes slightly burning as if I were sitting next to someone smoking. I am 40 yrs. old, never smoked, have been off depression meds for about 8 mos. No recent sinus infections.


This discussion is related to constantly smelling cigarette smoke.

[JAWiem]

my wife has the same problem...she just took 2 antacid pills - and it WENT AWAY!! TRY IT!  :)

[Kaydi35]

Have you had an MRI?

[Kaydi35]

I too have been smelling phantom cigarette smoke for the past six months.  Sometimes it is so strong that I cough and feel like I cannot breathe.  My husband nor I smoke.  We live in a new home where no one has ever smoked.  I am not around anyone who smokes.  I smell this phantom smoke everywhere I go.  It even wakes me from sleep.  I mentioned it to my pcp and he just made the comment that it was weird and left it at that.  A couple of months later, I mentioned it to my rheumatologist. He told me to schedule an appointment with a neurologist immediately.  I asked why the urgency and he explained that it could be just an olfactory hallucination or it could be something very serious.  I made the appointment with the neurologist who put me through a series of tests and this is what I found out.  The phantom smells I am having are actually seizures caused by a benign brain tumor called a meningioma. The meningioma is a tumor on the lining of the brain and spinal cord which contains 3 layers.  It is on the underside of my brain where the brain meets the stem/spinal cord.  The meningioma is pressing on the part of my brain that controls smell and taste.  I go back to the neurologist in Feb to discuss what comes next as far as treatment goes.  I don't know how large the tumor is and that will determine what treatment is required.  Even though the tumor is benign, it could possibly still be large and/or fast growing which can be fatal. It could also be small and/or slow growing which could require having an MRI every 3 months and just watching it. Other  treatments include surgery (if the tumor is accessible) and radiation which will make your hair fall out. I don't want to scare anyone, but I feel that if you are experiencing phantom smells, you should go to the doctor and get checked out to make sure it's not something serious.  My neurologist fussed at me for waiting so long to come see him and I've only been experiencing this for 6 months and it took me two months to get an appointment with him because he's the BEST in my area. I hope my post helps someone.  

[DoubleDose]

I have an observation that I think may be very IMPORTANT to many of us.  I also have had these phantom fumes and smells for over five months...and they have ranged from sickly sweet/ moldy to pungent chemical and diesel fuel/kerosene- like in odor.  Many times I have had these smells early upon waking , but the worst times have been middle of the night, where they would wake me up with a sickening start!  I had felt all along that we had mold issues in our HVAC, and over the months had an entirely new system installed, inside and out, with new ductwork, etc.  We even added the UV light, and had a major cleaning done...we are in an almost brand new home...   Guess what....the smell came back just as before.  About two weeks ago, doing research on these fumes and moldy sickening odors...I stumbled across several blogs and sites describing Phantosmia.  WOW!  A frightening realization slowly overcame me...that it has all been internal...and not external at all.  No one else ever smells the odors that I have complained about, of course.  So, the other night, to test my theory, I went to bed, and upon waking up early in the morning...checked to see if I could smell the "fumes"....  Slightly, but not overwhelming.  THEN, I made a slight depression in my pillow, and breathed into it four or five times without using my nose to breathe in...I then smelled the area slowly...and WOW!  Overpowering fumes there in the pillow...exactly of the same scent as the diesel and sickening sweet moldy smells I have had over many months.  

Here is my major take away from this  (and of course I did this little experiment about 20 times, to make sure the odor was coming OUT OF ME)........that we may not all be 'hallucinating odors' , or having some other worldly sensing type of wierd experience...but we may actually be smelling a very strange odor from our own breath!!!  Maybe coming from lungs...or abdominal/gastric areas, or sinuses.    I remember times my wife would occasionally have 'acetone' breath in the morning, and I would be amazed at how it smelled just like nail polish remover...exactly.  She could breathe at me, and it would be pure acetone. It only happened four or five times over the years. We looked it up and found this is common and is explained in medical literature as a known breath abberation.

So this leads me to this conclusion...we may ALSO be 'manufacturing' the odor that we frequently smell, and we may smell and percieve different versions of the odor, depending on our internal bodily conditions.  I do NOT know what may be producing the odor...but I do believe it is real...and we are highly sensitive to smelling it.  Try the pillow test next time you wake up to the nasty fumes.....breathe a bit of your own breath back in...and see if it is very strong and more intense.  I also had several moderate head bump situatiuons in the past year....sports related, which many claim can cause phantosmia....but I also have frequent sinus allergies  (not infection)...and this has also been implicated in the medical sites.   So, let's see if anyone else out there can determine whether their phantom smells and fumes are being 'imagined'/ hallucinated......OR rather being just plain produced by our bodies...and sensed very acutely when we breathe it in.  That is likely why it comes and goes randomly...depending on our day to day physical condition.  

I think that if people can develop 'acetone' breath, as my wife has in the past, and that itself is a very noxious smell....and is accepted as being caused by metabolic changes in an individual....then we may be producing a breath scent in a very similar manner.  We may just smell and taste our own noxious scent being produced for some unknown reason!!!!  The smell that I breathed into my pillow was the EXACT fume smell, times ten!!!  It comes from inside of ME!!!

[Kay_Fay]

Wow !!! I have been driving my family crazy asking them are sure you don't smell that ! I have even questioned them about smoking in the house.
I to have NEVER smoked and do not allow in the house. But for a week now I have smelling Smoke. At first it was just when I was laid down at night. I washed all bedding and CLEANED everything. Bit it got worse now I smell it all the time very strong and now it burns my nose and I can taste it !!! This is horrible, I feel like others can smell me but they say No and look at me as if I've lost it. I have had acid re flux in the past but I am not on a daily Med. My dad was a heavy smoker and passed away with complications of COPD. So this is very difficult for me  

[Claisabel]

Yayyyy I am not crazy !!! Constantly I would ask my husband if he smelled the cigarette and his replied was always negative. But after reading this thread, I must write that, first I am not imagining things and second the relation to the acid reflux medications.
I did take some medication for acid reflux recently because of some antibiotics, destroying my stomach. Does anyone know why one thing can cause the other (or is related) and how to get rid of the cigarette smell?