Bad taste in mouth

[twist330]

Can anyone help?

I have a really bad taste in my mouth.

It initally started when I was given amitriptlyne to take at night this was added to Lyrica which I had taken for several months. Then the amitriptlyne was replaced by Cymblata my Dr told me this would get rid of the taste in the mouth, which it did for about a month now it's back. I can't work out what is causing it or could it actually be a symptom of something?

Really could do with your help here.

p.s. I'm not pregnant.

[twist330]

Hi thanks for your help.- To answer some of your questions.

I don't have a dry mouth at all just a bad taste that I can't even explain what the bad taste tastes like!

Apart from the Cymblata & Lyrica I also take one sachet of Macrogol and 2 senakot tablets at night to releve constipation.

I have asthma and have a steriod based inhaler Qvar which I have used through a spacer daily for about 4 years with no adverse effects. Before this I took becotide which did keep giving me oral thrush but it does not seem like this. I also take ventolin.

I am not aware of any other deficiencies and have no problem with blood sugar or thyriod as far as I am aware.

THe "pregnant" issue was when I googled this it kept coming up which reminded me that I had a metalic taste when I was pregnant and I kept eating cheese and onion crisps!

Twist

[twopack]

Let's see Twist.  I know amitriptyline can cause the bad taste and that would look like the most likely culprit according to your timeline, except that the symptom has returned now.  Otherwise, I think all three of these drugs cause dry mouth and that can certainly contribute to oral hygiene problems (and therefore taste challenges).

Do you take anything else?  Any steroid based nasal spray?  How about your diet?  Any changes there?  I think some vitamin deficiencies could be linked (maybe zinc?).  Any known thyroid or blood sugar problems?  I believe they can contribute too.

Taste involves the mouth, tongue (taste buds), nasal passages, sense of smell and the parts of the brain that interpret the signals the various organs send.  Not to sound too obvious but your answer (or the problem) lies somewhere along that path.

Don't short change the role of your brain.  I've always been fascinated by the senses and how individual we are in our experience of them.  I'll risk boring you with a personal experience that probably isn't interesting to anybody other than me (but I'm too far in now).  

Eons ago, I spent a semester in a biology lab (took the class and worked a job behind the scenes).  The smell of formaldehyde permeates everything and I wondered if my nasal passages would ever be clear of it.  I didn't give a thought to the connection being made between the offensive smell and the visual of the items - enough said - stored IN the formaldehyde.  

Some thirty years later, I went to a Body Worlds exhibit.  You probably need to be a science nerd to even consider going to this exhibit.  It's a bazaar but fascinating display of plasticized bodies suspended in various stages of dissection (which obviously! doesn't suit every taste).  
Anyway, I kept getting light whiffs of that formaldehyde smell.  Nobody around me smelled anything and nothing like that is used in the preservation process.

I finally realized this was a memory association and my brain was able to conjure up a very realistic virtual edition of the odor it considered the nose had failed to supply.  Strange science.  Fascinating, but I'm sure glad it doesn't happen every time I get the meat out to cook dinner.  The End.

A long story demonstrating that when it comes to the human body, explanations and solutions are seldom as one-dimensional as we would think.  This is also proof positive that it is possible to indulge in the wordy addiction of On-And-On ANON members (founder, Quixotic1) without ever actually providing an answer to the original question!

Hope someone else can supply an easy answer.
Mary

p.s.  I'm not sure of the pregnancy connection here other than to know it's very possible to start getting that bad taste in your mouth somewhere around 13 years post delivery.