Desperately Reeking Susan
A friend wants to break up with a woman he's started seeing because he can't stand her smell (her natural scent; it's not a hygiene issue). Friends say he's being too nitpicky, and this is not a reason to break up. P.S. He isn't someone who normally goes around being put off by people's smell.
--Sympathetic
It's hard enough to apply latex before sex without breaking the mood. Try telling your girlfriend that you just have to hose her down with Febreze. This friend of yours could love this woman's heart, mind, and spirit, but that isn't going to cut it if, for him, "a rose by any other name" is pretty much "goat vomit." His friends shouldn't blame him. Chances are, his genes make him do it. Research by biologist Claus Wedekind and others suggests we evolved to prefer the smell of a partner whose immune system is quite different from ours, probably so we'll produce children with a broader set of defenses from parasites and diseases. Your friend needs to end it before this woman gets attached and, especially, before he loses it and blurts out, "What the hell's that perfume you're always wearing, Eau Did Your Septic Tank Back Up Again"?
I'm always amazed by these outsiders who presume to tell people that they're being too nitpicky over an issue...one wonders how they'd react to the same issue.
How do you get intimate with someone who smells bad? "Is that you I smell, darling, or did I forget to the put the ground beef I bought yesterday into the refrigerator?"
And even if she's not as pungent as all that, who are outsiders to decide what should or shouldn't be important to someone?
"You're being too particular! So what if she's wanted in twelve states for grand larceny? Picky, picky picky!"
"Oh, gee. You're right. I'll just turn off my apprehension about the issue and dive right in."
Do people have dimmer switches for their priorities? Can we suddenly tone down what is important to us into a "marginally important issue" or even "off" completely? It would be nice if we did. We'd just be able to love anyone. Just turn down that pesky primary issue of having all her teeth and not having halitosis that wilts all the plants in your house into a secondary, tertiary, or non-issue, and you're a match made in Heaven.
As I said in the last column commentary, he likes what he likes. No amount of cajoling, belittling, warnings, etc., is going to change the guy's priorities.
Patrick at February 3, 2010 5:55 AM
Have his friends met her? If they can't smell anything wrong with her it is more understandable. If they havent met her and dont understand her reekage, it's another issue.
NicoleK at February 3, 2010 6:33 AM
Gotta say, though, I was once in a situation like this. There was this guy... not a handsome one, but so cool he became hot. Great sense of humor, witty, kind, smart... very sexy guy even though he wasn't handsome. But he stank.
He didn't bathe regularly. And he was overweight, so he probably sweat more than other people. I don't know the true source of his stench, but he reeked as though he didn't bathe or change his clothes.
I almost made a pass at him (he really was a very cool guy) but just couldn't. It was one of those the faces are close together moments, and if I had tilted my head back a kiss would have happened, but as it happened the stink made me move away. My friend almost made a pass at him, but just couldn't. Same situation.
Finally a friend told him he needed to bathe. It just made him mad. The friend tried to explain that all these chicks wanted him but were put off by his stench, but he just got upset. What can you do.
NicoleK at February 3, 2010 6:38 AM
How did they get together in the first place? Did he have a cold?
My take on the issue is that we are all entitled to our likes and dislikes. Sometimes, you can't even put your reasons into words. Annoyances won't get better with time.
MarkD at February 3, 2010 7:39 AM
How one smells to another is very important, and I'm not talking about showers or deodorant.
I had a short relationship with a man who had a very strong odor, to me at least. It must have been some kind of pheromone or something, I don't know. What I do know is that it didn't bother me while we were together, but after we broke up that same aroma was totally repulsive, and it wasn't a bad breakup, we just lost interest.
You know those couples you see sometimes and you wonder how they can possibly be together? One theory is scent attraction. They might not even notice it. I'm sure there's a word for it, like invisible or inaudible for vision and hearing.
Oh great, I just remembered that "Ally McBeal" thing about her and her childhood boyfriend smelling each other's butts like dogs.
Pricklypear at February 3, 2010 8:06 AM
Honestly, I completely understand where this is coming from. I love the way my boyfriend smells. Just him, not cologne or shower gel or deoderant. I sleep with my face on his shoulder or against his back becuase the smell relaxes me and helps me sleep. Yet, if I were asked to describe the smell I couldn't. I can't even imagine how off-putting the opposite issue would be. Having this non-smell, smell be something unpleasant would be totally repulsive whenever you were close to the other person.
The guy should move on and ignore his friends.
Mojo at February 3, 2010 9:08 AM
I was under the impression that the girl doesn't "stink", per se - that most people wouldn't think anything about it. But that for him, her smell is off-putting. I used to date a guy like that. It was his breath. And he didn't have bad breath, so to speak - he had good dental hygiene, it was just that something about his breath didn't work for me. Yeah, it didn't last long.
Personally, I think it's a chemistry issue. I read somewhere that people tend to close their eyes when they kiss because it heightens the sense of smell, and that we tend to choose compatible partners based on smell. Works for me.
Oh - I agree with Patrick, too. Regardless of the issue and whether it is or is not petty, nit-picky, whatever, it's a turn-off for him and no amount of talking or wishing is going to change that.
Anne at February 3, 2010 9:08 AM
This is one of those times when the evo/psych stuff is really important, but we try to ignore it in the interest of fairness. Beyond looking for a certain smell, women are also interested MORE in a mans smell when ovulating... and when there is an edge difference it can be complex. My ex hated my smell EXCEPT when she wes ovu. and then she couldn't keep her hands off, and the extremes proved to be a harbinger of doom, eventually.
Guys aren't nearly so sensitive to it, which would seem to indicate that it is a big red X to boyo, and he should heed it. there are plenty of things that can be flexible in the laws of attraction, but some of the basics should be accepted. It takes fortitude to overcome design principles that evolved over eons. Regardless if you believe we were made by luck, or some flying speghetti monster, we were meant to be this way.
SwissArmyD at February 3, 2010 10:00 AM
I had a problem similar to this one. A girl that I really loved and got along with great just didn't smell or taste right. I tried to deal with it (because it seemed shallow), but it turned me off. She didn't smell "bad", just not "right" to me. We are animals, after all. My current girlfriend smells wonderful to me, even when she's really sweaty.
Chris at February 3, 2010 1:13 PM
Wy do some women smell bad? And others use smelly perfume? I don't know.
I do know this: Bathing regularly, and not using perfume, is probably best.
Back when I was young and handome, and got lots of girls into bed, I always washed them off first in the shower.
BOTU at February 3, 2010 1:45 PM
The taste thing goes along with the smell. If someone does not taste good (natural taste, not garlic bread) when you kiss him, it is your body chemistry telling you your immune systems are not compatible. People should pay more attention to their evolutionary psychology.
I have to say, this does seem more like a question a woman would ask. You know, she's sitting with her friends in the cafe and brings up the fact that everything is great except...he has this smell. Friends tell her she is too picky and if she doesn't get her act together she'll never get married. I wonder if that is what is going on here. Friends and/or family are urging him to "settle down" and feel he is always to picky. Like Chris said above, I guess it does seem shallow, but ignoring each other's body chemistry (something not exactly fixable) forever seems like it's over the line of what you should do to make a relationship work.
NumberSix at February 3, 2010 1:53 PM
BOTU, you could scrub with Lava soap five times a day and it would not to a thing to change your natural smell. Body chemistry is not fixed by Axe body wash, no matter what the commercials would have you believe.
NumberSix at February 3, 2010 1:56 PM
The thing about this letter is (and MarkD @ 7:39am somewhat addressed this issue) that THEY JUST MET, and the b/f is already telling his friends about her natural body scent in her nether regions. Doesn't anyone else find this just totally inappropriate??? Is nothing sacred?
If "Sympathetic" truly is the "friend", then i would say there are boundary issues here. I certainly wouldn't want to be the "stinky g/f" and go on a group date with any of these friends, who all seem to know about her nether-region smell... how embarrassing. The LW is either the actual b/f, or else something else stinks!
I would say, though, that for someone to be that put off by the natural body odour of their g/f, then they truly do have a problem.
Bluejean Baby at February 3, 2010 8:07 PM
"Have his friends met her? If they can't smell anything wrong with her it is more understandable. If they havent met her and dont understand her reekage, it's another issue."
Okay, what are the friends to do?... spread her out and give her a whiff, then pronounce her as salvageable? Geesh! I think NicoleK missed the point.
"Back when I was young and handome, and got lots of girls into bed, I always washed them off first in the shower."
Yeah, like "comeere swine, into the tub you go" ...that ought to set the mood, eh?
Bluejean Baby at February 3, 2010 8:12 PM
I did not take it as simply a nether-region smell. People have a natural scent that they exude from their pores, which are everywhere. Ever notice when a guy just smells really good, not soap or anything?I'ts just his natural scent. I used to have a friend in high school that was diabetic, and she smelled sort of fruity-sweet, which is a byproduct from some chemical reaction in some diabetics. It came out through her pores. You could smell it just standing close to her. I guess some people just have a bad natural scent, or at least one that some people are more sensitive to.
NumberSix at February 3, 2010 9:06 PM
I'm still holding that she doesn't have a BAD smell. I think it's along the lines of what Chris said. It's not that it's "bad", it's just "not right" to HIM. The next guy might think she smells wonderful. That's a chemistry thing and not a hygiene thing. And Bluejean Baby - what made you think he's talking about her nethers? I went back and re-read the original letter and nothing even hinted at that.
Anne at February 4, 2010 8:32 AM
yikes - hit the wrong button! I can relate, I never liked my mothers smell and although I loved her as much as a daughter can love a mother, her smell just put me off.
It's not about taking a shower, she wasn't a pig, she just had a natural smell to her that I didn't find attractive.
My husband on the other hand has a smell that IS very attractive and I do believe it's chemistry and all the other scientific junk spouted above. He just smells right to me.
If this guy can't get past his nose, she isn't right for him and never will be no matter how long she marinates herself in colognes and lotions.
Tori at February 4, 2010 8:34 AM
As for the his friends, I think that there's a natural tendency for people, both men and women, to defend women in these situations - where attraction comes down to appearance, or some other physical attribute.
It seems calloused to break up with her over something that she can't control. But of course, they're asking him to remain with a woman that he's not attracted to. So they're not too concerned with his welfare or happiness. They just want him to man-up and bear it.
Of course, if the roles were reversed, her friends would completely support her desire to break it off ;)
Maxi at February 4, 2010 9:34 AM
You're not doing someone a favor if you get deeply involved with them when you're not physically attracted to them (and that's ultimately what not liking someone's smell amounts to). Unless the unpleasant smell is caused by something temporary, it's not going to change. One of two things will happen, either he'll get used to it (and then possibly eventually come to like it through association with other positive memories relating to the bond), or it'll bother him more and more until eventually he can't stand it anymore. I'd say give it a little time, until he knows whether or not he's likely to get used to it.
Note that lots of things can cause unpleasant smell that are not necessarily permanent, e.g. diet, bacteria, internal body processes.
Lobster at February 4, 2010 10:14 AM
It might've been helpful to have a description of the smell, as that could give an indication as to the cause.
"If someone does not taste good (natural taste, not garlic bread) when you kiss him, it is your body chemistry telling you your immune systems are not compatible."
I doubt our body chemistry is that 'intelligent', we're generally all 'compatible' on a purely biological level. However, if you don't like someone's smell, you don't like their smell, and you're not *psychologically* compatible - it's like finding someone ugly - if you think they're ugly, you think they're ugly, regardless of whether there is any logic in it or not; I think it's very important to like your partner's smell.
Just for interest I recall once reading how the Pill (and different Pill types, in different ways) can change what smells a woman are attracted to or repulsed by, so if a woman starts on the Pill in a middle of a relationship it can apparently contribute to putting her off her partner.
"And he didn't have bad breath, so to speak - he had good dental hygiene, it was just that something about his breath didn't work for me."
Smells on a person's breath can be caused by various things, including diet or diet changes that may be temporary. A fruity or acetone-like scent on someone's breath can be the result of the body undergoing ketosis, e.g. if someone is on a low-carb diet or losing weight.
An ammonia or urea like scent in your sweat can be caused simply by your body temporarily breaking down protein in order to digest amino acids for energy (and may indicate you're not getting enough carbs for your activity levels).
I probably don't need to mention the classic fish-scent problem that women may get that can be caused by bacteria, it may even be this. Some diseases can cause body odours, e.g. lung cancer can be 'smelled' on the breath.
Lobster at February 4, 2010 10:28 AM
I get what you're saying, Lobster. I just don't think you're getting what I (and some others) are saying. There was nothing *wrong* with his breath - it didn't smell "bad" - it wasn't garlic, onion, ketosis, liquor, or any other bad smell - I just didn't like it - it didn't smell "right" to me.
People *do* have different body chemistries that affect scent and smell, whether you believe it or not. That's why they tell you when you're shopping for a new scent to always try it on first and then wait 30 minutes and smell it *on you* to see if it still smells good. I remember when I was in high school one of the popular perfumes was "Lady Stetson" - no idea if they even make that any more. But it smelled great on my girlfriends, and on me it smelled like rancid cat piss. So, yeah, people's body chemistry DEFINITELY is different without there being something "causing" it and it's not that it's bad, it just doesn't mesh with some people.
Anne at February 4, 2010 12:17 PM
Research by biologist Claus Wedekind and others suggests we evolved to prefer the smell of a partner whose immune system is quite different from ours, probably so we'll produce children with a broader set of defenses from parasites and diseases.
Is this bit above invisible to a number of you? Just wondering, because the comments here -- a number of them -- reflect not having read it.
Should this be a lesson to me to hammer people over the head with information more than I do?
Amy Alkon at February 4, 2010 12:57 PM
Amy sez: "Should this be a lesson to me to hammer people over the head with information more than I do? ".
Nope. It's just a symptom of the attention deficit society we live in. We skim past the theory and go for the juicy stuff when reading a blog...kinda like reading quickly through the pages of a romance novel when a steamy scene is coming up. Don't tell me no one (else) out there has done that! :-)
The LW's friend should move on. There's no way to change something that's deeply biological. You can only create coping strategies or compromise. Who wants to base a relationship on that?
TallDarkNGruesome at February 4, 2010 5:48 PM
I've had that happen, a person's natural smell can make or break it. One guy, our families knew each other, was great for all purposes but I couldn't handle his body
scent. My mother always backed me up on that one since she ultimately didn't think we were a good match and time has told that it wouldn't have been.
My live-in ex used to just exude his natural body odor out of every pore whenever he was sick, I called it "Jeffing". It didn't smell bad, just so potent when he was ill. I would wash all the bedding when he recovered.
It's like walking into your parents or friends closet, you can just smell their scent in the air or you keep an article that reminds you of love lost. They themselves can't smell a thing.
LittleRhedd at February 5, 2010 12:12 AM
I've seen parts of experiments on TV with unidentified dirty T-shirts in jars, and women smell and rate them. Those they didn't like the smell of were from men they were genetically close to (father's and brother's shirts were included in the mix).
I think my husband is the best-smelling man in the world :-) The first time I kissed him I was hooked....his scent was dizzyingly good. I sleep on his pillow when he's away, and sometimes wear his pajama top. He sometimes catches me smelling his shirts and always says 'He-he-he-HEN yo!' (You're..you're...you're...weird!) but it always makes him laugh.
On the other end of the scale, when I was in high school I had a crush in a guy who worked in the same super market as I did. One hot day he was out getting carriages, and I was leaving. I handed him my can of Coke, he drank from it and gave it back. As I continued on home I went to drink from it and UGH! That was that....
crella at February 5, 2010 1:53 AM
Amy,
First of all, I believe that Claus Wedekind's research only established this smell attraction phenomenon for women. Do you know of any studies that have established this explicitly for men?
Secondly, research by Claus Wedekind also indicated that the normal smell attraction response was completely reversed when women were taking hormonal contraceptives.
The basic idea is that fertile women are most attracted to men whose immune systems differ from their own, but pregnant women prefer the company of men whose immune systems are similar to their own. This makes sense in that a woman who is pregnant will probably want to spend more of her time with family and surrounded by men who will protect her when she is vulnerable (i.e. the men in her family).
Hormonal contraceptives play havoc on the normal modes of attraction.
The fact that various chemicals can interfere with the normal attraction response in women suggests that if this phenomenon plays a role in male attraction as well that it can be similarly subverted by hormonal medications.
Kara at February 5, 2010 1:27 PM
Amy Alkon
https://www.advicegoddess.com/ag-column-archives/2010/02/desperately-ree.html#comment-1693610">comment from KaraYes, there are studies on men -- I think one of Wedekind's colleagues at Max Planck did one of them. Manheim somebody or something like that. Sorry -- in a rush right now, can't look it up or dig through my file. Wrote this about a month ago, and I have a mind like a steel sieve.
And Marti Haselton of UCLA did the contraceptive studies. I laugh with a friend of mine who's an ev psych who takes birth control because she knows very well the research on this.
Amy Alkon at February 5, 2010 1:40 PM
Some anecdotes and thoughts:
USAF in Korea: You get off the plane in a warm month and smell garlic. Over time it is a background odor. It is a background odor on the majority of Koreans. I lived downtown with a local and did the Korean diet. Very healthy and weight loss was great.) I walked into a secured area that was USAF only, no Koreans allowed. A guy looked up and said "Who left in the Korean?" Prejudiced SOB, but...
IT desk service (have to go to hands-on). Had a user that 1-2 times a week had to go to her desktop. She would stand behind me as I sat. I could tell the week instantly.
Ex-GF: A heavy onion recipe meal and 3-4 hours later if I was at her core both of us could tell she had them. Not overwhelming, but noticable.
Another thing is that diabetics will dump crap out ther pores IIRC ketones that have an odor.
Some of it is natural, some of it is diet, some could be disease.
If you totally write off someone without a polite comment -- you may not know, and neither will they, that it is to be looked at.
Jim P. at February 5, 2010 7:26 PM
"I get what you're saying, Lobster. I just don't think you're getting what I (and some others) are saying. There was nothing *wrong* with his breath - it didn't smell "bad""
Sigh .. and what on earth gives you the impression I didn't "get" that, other than your own 100% imagined assumption?
Lobster at February 7, 2010 3:10 PM
"People *do* have different body chemistries that affect scent and smell, whether you believe it or not."
WTF - where on EARTH did I say I disagree with that? Honestly, stop making things up in your head.
Lobster at February 7, 2010 3:12 PM
"Is this bit above invisible to a number of you? Just wondering, because the comments here -- a number of them -- reflect not having read it."
Not sure if that was directed at me, but I wasn't ignoring that; what I was saying is the fact that that bit of research doesn't represent a "100% rule" ... i.e. it may be the case that *on average* your 'body chemistry' will make better-than-average mate choices based on smell in terms of producing progeny with better e.g. immune systems, but that does NOT equate to "if you don't like the person's smell you're not compatible" and it does NOT equate to any kind of absolute rule that your body smell preference ALWAYS leads to a good choice immune-system wise --- just that in the majority of cases it probably does.
The problem with things like that is that the majority of people don't understand this; they read some random Cosmo article about research on body chemistry and smells and immune systems etc., and then in the minds of most it solidifies as a mindless "rule" that their body chemistry is somehow always 'intelligent' and that 'if I like this person's smell we're chemically compatible and if I don't we're chemically not'. You can most certainly mate with someone whose smell you aren't crazy about, and I can assure you your odds of producing quite healthy offspring will remain very good indeed.
I mean, from an evolutionary perspective, these preferences primarily select against inbreeding. The negative effects of inbreeding are slightly over-exaggerated; there is actual research, for example, showing that you can breed with a first cousin and the odds of problems with the child are basically no higher than average --- the problems generally start coming in when inbreeding is compounded over more than one generation.
So it might be that if someone breeds with someone whose smell they don't like, AND their offspring do it for multiple successive generations, that you'll start having major problems. But this generally is very unlikely to happen, and in the end it'll all average out; by the next generation, the offspring will be re-mixing with more diverse DNA anyway.
So what I'm saying is, if you're in love with (and having a fantastic relationship with) someone whose smell you otherwise don't like, and you one day read about that research, don't take it as some kind of 'sign' that you should consider ending the relationship. Because that's what people do. Some magazine or website points to research A, B or C, and some people take that far too seriously, as some kind of 'sign'.
Lobster at February 7, 2010 3:30 PM
I doubt the guy who wrote this letter (or his "friend) read about body chemistry in a Cosmo article and took it as some sort of "sign" that they were incompatible. Guys do not typically chat over salads about reading the "signs" that they are incompatible with their girlfriends. The guy in question had just started seeing this woman and was worried enough about this issue that he asked his friends. There was no indication in the letter that this guy makes a habit of nitpicking and then breaking up with women, so it seems that it is enough of a problem for him to actually write to an advice columnist (know any guys who do that regularly?) and ask if it meant something. I'm sorry, he's asking for his "friend," but, still, this is out of character for your typical male. And this guy is not madly in love with her otherwise, their relationship is new. Not liking someone's body chemistry at the beginning of a relationship seems a hard thing to get past.
NumberSix at February 7, 2010 8:01 PM
"I doubt the guy who wrote this letter (or his "friend) read about body chemistry in a Cosmo article and took it as some sort of "sign" that they were incompatible."
Read the whole thread to see what I wrote in context instead of pulling assumptions out the air about what I'm saying.
Lobster at February 8, 2010 4:06 AM
Read the whole thread to see what I wrote in context instead of pulling assumptions out the air about what I'm saying.
Yes, sir. Just trying to pull this back into the context of the original letter, which why I thought we were here.
NumberSix at February 8, 2010 12:42 PM
Amy usually has contact with her letter writers long before we see the final draft, so maybe she knows more about this than we do, but....
Setting aside the smell issue (which I do understand, and may well be spot on), is it possible that this guy is commitment averse? The friends tell him he's too nitpicky - maybe they know something we don't. Sort of like the Seinfeldian Man Hands, Close Talker, etc. Some of us run because we can't be close. If we do so because it's what we WANT, fine. But if we whine to our friends that we can't find "the one", while dismissing good candidates because they smell a bit too much like curry every fortnight or so, maybe we need to look at our own motivations.
Laurie at February 9, 2010 11:18 AM
Like I said earlier, there is no evidence in the letter we have that suggests that this guy habitually picks the nits. His friends are telling him he is being too nitpicky, not that he always is. For a guy who doesn't normally do this (if this is, in fact, the case), it seems a big deal to actually bring this up to his friends and then write to (or have a friend write to) an advice columnist.
But, you are right that people who make a habit of being nitpicky and then whining about not finding any good women (or men) are looking for reasons to not get close. I was thinking that it is a typically female trait (I have friends who do this), but then you reminded me of Man Hands. And the woman who only has the one dress. And the woman who ate her peas one at a time.
NumberSix at February 9, 2010 2:44 PM
Finally a friend told him he needed to bathe. It just made him mad. The friend tried to explain that all these chicks wanted him but were put off by his stench, but he just got upset. What can you do.
If I heard that advice, I would take freaking baths regularly (as I actually do). Some people simply don't want to learn. Or they only feel validated if they are accepted precisely as they are, no matter how repulsive they are to other people.
mpetrie98 at February 9, 2010 3:26 PM
I probably don't need to mention the classic fish-scent problem that women may get that can be caused by bacteria, it may even be this. Some diseases can cause body odours, e.g. lung cancer can be 'smelled' on the breath.
One cause of fish scent is the lack of an enzyme to break down a smelly chemical either found in food or as a by-product of digestion. So this smelly chemical simply circulates throughout your body and oozes out of your pores and on your breath.
mpetrie98 at February 9, 2010 3:35 PM
Hey, I completely understand. I once dated a man whose smell reminded me of my brother. THAT relationship didn't last long. Great guy, good looking, great job, liked his friends - but I couldn't kiss him without thinking of my brother. Total mood killer.
Kelly at July 16, 2010 6:28 PM
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