New and Improved Vaginaromatherapy

There are a lot of smells in labor and delivery. When I was in nursing school, our clinical professor for OB warned us before our first day in L&D: Make sure you eat breakfast, but not too much. And, for God's sake, if you think you might faint, get out of the room and go sit down somewhere. It's the smells more than the sights that'll get to you. Even the cleanest of women won't be "fresh" at the end of labor -- and believe me -- not everyone arrives at the hospital freshly bathed. Unfortunately, a parallel truth is that even the cleanest labor and delivery nurse will not be "fresh" after a busy 12-hour shift. We pick up smells and we generate a few of our own, too. So toward the end of my shift, I'm often trying to figure out if the origin of what I'm smelling is somewhere on my body, or if I've just got tiny vaginaromatherapy particles stuck in my nose.

And don't think that this is just a nurse problem, because it can happen in other professions as well. Back in my catering days, I used to work pretty much every day and every night in the month of December. Because December was the only month in which I made anything like enough money, I would often schedule doctor, dentist, opthamologist appointments for this time of year also -- usually because I either had some problem (like taped together glasses) that I felt like I couldn't afford to fix any other time of year, or because I would have a sudden, late night panic attack: It's been 3 years since my last pap smear! This is how I found myself making crabcakes for 250 one December morning before a gynecologist appointment.

Have you ever "picked" jumbo lump crabmeat under the anal retentive supervision of an OCD chef? You have to get tiny bits of shell out without inadvertently turning the jumbo lumps into lumps or smaller. (Jumbo lump is more expensive, you don't want your customers looking at the crabcakes and wondering why the lumps are so small -- to this day, however, I've never seen anyone say anything but, ooh, crabcakes!) In order to accomplish this task, you cannot wear gloves. If you wear gloves, you just can't feel the little bits of shell. So, on this particular December morning, I spent about 3 hours carefully picking jumbo lump crabmeat with my bare hands before I left for my gynecologist appointment. I assure you that I washed my hands thoroughly and at great length before I left. (For the record, I also washed my hands thoroughly before I plunged them into the crab.)

I'm about half way to the doctor's office when I realize that I can still smell crab. I decide to light a cigarette so I can stink of smoke instead of crab. (I've since quit smoking) I get to the office, sign in, sit down and start perusing the magazine selection. As I'm checking out the 50 most beautiful people of the year, I start to become aware, once again, of the aroma of crab. Although, I realize that without the jumbo lump crabmeat actually in the room with us, the smell would be impossible for most people to identify as crab. It's just a vague, unpleasant fishy smell.

Here is my dilemma: Is the smell on my skin, my hair, my clothes? Or do I just have crabaromatherapy particles stuck in my nose? I look around at the other patients and try to tell from their faces if they are smelling me. One woman has a sort of disgusted cast to her mouth and nose, but since I've never seen her before, I can't really tell if her face just always looks like that or if she's reacting to my aroma. I briefly consider passing the blame: Excuse me miss, but are you smelling what I'm smelling? I dismiss this idea, or actually just sort of forget it, because now I'm starting to worry about what I'll say or not say to the doctor. Hey doc, you know that fishy smell that you smell? I just wanted you to know that it is NOT coming from my vagina. This is a fine tactic, if I were certain that he could smell the smell. But if the smell is just tiny particles trapped in my nose, then I've made him wonder why I think he might be smelling fish while doing my pap smear. Once I've got him wondering, I either have to just let him keep wondering or tell him a long crabcake story. Either one of these options will probably get me a special notation in my chart and possibly a psych consult.

As it turns out, the nurse practitioner, who is a very relaxed,engaging person, does my pap smear and I tell her the story and we have a laugh. She very graciously denies smelling anything out of the ordinary.