I started smoking as a teenager and almost entirely lost my sense of smell. I later spent years working in cafes and bars and did a lot of food and beverage tastings where I used my limited sense of smell to the best of my ability and got pretty good at it. Eventually I met my favorite person, who didn't smoke, so I quit and over the course of the following weeks it felt like I was regaining my sense of smell with owed interest. I found out my city smells like shit and piss, flowers can have powerful aromas you smell from some distance, and some smells had become physically distressing to me. At one point I went to my favorite person's house, commented that it smelled like old grapes when they opened the door, and found out they had burnt a scented candle called champagne dream hours ago. At the height of it I thought I would eventually learn to smell the future.

I find I filter more now but I still find a lot of stronger smells to be deeply unpleasant and I don't recall being sensitive like this as a child.

I learned to identify some smells and relate the experience to others but my notes tended to be very basic, especially compared to a friend who was working on his level two sommelier test (who was ruthlessly empirical in his epicureanism so I believe wasn't bullshiting the wine snobbery).