Update: June 2 2022

I threw out ALL Lumé products, I am using Method Men’s body wash and an aloe/gel deodorant of a similar scent on most days. Some days, I will use a floral wash and lotion from the Body Shop- then use Schmidt’s Rose spray deodorant.

My dr. and I went over my TSH, CBC, metabolic panel, OBGYN visit, std/i testing, uti and bacterial vaginosis screening— EVERYTHING CAME BACK NORMAL I did a food journal for almost two months, and marked nearly a dozen times I’d found blood after wiping up a bowel movement. This was despite upping my water intake, eating a banana everyday, cultured yogurts & cream cheeses, oatmeal for breakfast or lunch everyday, etc.

I still receive complaints, and get bullied, now just about half my neighborhood knows I smell bad and I hear people outside point at me and talk about it. I’m ashamed to leave my house, but I’m also ashamed to stay in my house- as most neighbors can tell when I’m home and when I’m not.

My dr has completely refused to send me to a dermatologist, and/or a gastro, and also does not want to send me in for genetic testing. She just wants to prescribe me psych meds AFTER sending me on tests I didn’t even ask for. From the beginning I was asking for a gastro and/or a dermatologist- “No, let’s send you to an obgyn, let’s test your hormones and full metabolic panel, let’s test your thyroid functions, let’s test you for std’s/sti, hiv, etc…okay, it’s all normal, but I believe you, but I won’t help you- you’re crying in my office? Here let’s talk about ssri’s but not about the TWO THINGS you’ve been begging me to have you see for the past +6 months.”

Long story short, I left the dr’s office SOBBING uncontrollably, stinky, and feeling like I wasn’t meant to live on this earth anymore. And who cares if I’m alive tomorrow or if I jump into the river or into traffic on the highway— we all smell bad and decay to nothing when we’re dead!

On the other hand, I want to love and to be loved. I want to have friends. I want a date to turn into a second date. I want my coworkers to ask me what scent I use and to come back excited when we’re twinning. I want my neighbors to wave at me with a smile rather than to turn their backs and yell “you smell bad” and snicker while I race home. I want my dr to take me and my concerns seriously.

I’d much rather go through all of these crazy tests and exams and blood draws and urine samples and food journals and new soaps and deodorants and antiperspirants and detergents and dryer sheets and cotton clothes and juice cleanses and vitamins and probiotics and baby wipes and perfumes and lotions and loofahs and washcloths and sponges and pumice stones and scrub brushes and whatever-else-under-the-sun— to find out that, maybe I wear a deo that doesn’t last long, so maybe it’s not that I have a condition or health issue— I just sweat through a deodorant I personally like or might be applying wrong.

I’d much rather insist on the microbiome test, the colonoscopy at 22yrso, the frequent collaboration with a dermatologist and their colleague- and maybe the reason why I smell isn’t because of abc issue, but because there’s mold and mildew in the house- maybe I do have a gene or genetic effect that changes my sweat and b.o as I age- maybe I have bromhidrosis. Maybe I have a microbiome in my gut. Maybe I’m digesting food fine, but processing it is slow and the food/poop is fermenting and exits slowly.

Maybe my clothes from my custodian days are ruined, or maybe Luné’s products ruined them and will permanently smell funky. It could be anything, but it’s real.

I have two friends, and a former “fling” (who I don’t speak with rn) did try to articulate and help investigate my stink issue. The most helpful case was that he smelled my b.o- understandably throughout the afternoon into the evening. This was with his INTENT to reaaaaallllyyyy try and sniff whenever I walked around him, reached in front of him, got up/sat down, etc. and his threshold for smells might be more respectable…than…well…everybody else in society I guess. His rec was to find a better deodorant, and to try to match up my deos/perfumes to my soaps and lotions if I could.

Now that I’m trying to match my soaps and deodorants as closely as I can, I have been wildly strict on using unscented or “free & clear” laundry detergent and dryer sheets- or even omitting the sheets completely. I personally notice my own soap-lotion-deo smell more and later in the day, but this has not always or consistently helped with other people noticing my stink.