Today's Women of Age

Scent is such an amazing sensory tool. One that can conjure up powerful and even distant memories. Favorites for me include freshly mown grass, a wood fire, a fresh Christmas tree, and my grandparent’s house.

But I’ll admit most of us go through life hoping not to smell of anything. We bath, wash our hair, put on clean clothes with the goal of slipping under the scent radar. To be neutral.

It doesn’t always work.

I have recently discovered that adults over 40 have an additional situation going on. We have more 2-nonenal , which is a greasy, gassy scent from unsaturated fatty acids breaking down on our skin. So we can do everything right, practice good hygiene and still not feel (or smell) as fresh as a daisy.

A dear friend recently admitted she has bought a special soap (Japanese persimmon extract soap is recommended) to help with that “old-people smell.” And during the last four months I have been trying different perfumes in the hopes of finding one that can be my “signature scent” to cover up any potential smell.

But it is yet one more thing in the aging agenda that caught me off guard–that I might smell funky just because I’m older! And it has occurred to me that I need to accept that stuff is just going to keep changing. In my mind I am still in my 40s, but I’m not. I’m decades past that.

And the advice given to mitigate old-people smell? High on the list is bath regularly, exfoliate your skin, wear clean clothes, drink plenty of water, and use scented products.

Nothing revolutionary. Just practice good hygiene and wear scent. I just hate to think of what’s down the road that I still don’t know about!