Around the same time, my mom had been dealing with a series of debilitating health issues of her own but had been putting off going to the doctor to get things checked out because she was so focused on taking care of dad.

Eventually, she went to the doctor and after she had a colonoscopy, we were shocked to learn in October that she had Stage 3B colon cancer.

She’s had two surgeries since then, one to remove the tumor and one for the port she’ll need in order to receive her chemo treatments, which start soon.

So naturally, my sisters and I did everything we could to make her Christmas as special as possible. After losing my dad, and then finding out her diagnosis and being worried about the uncertainty of it all, we wanted her to just have a day full of happiness and love and no worries.

It all went great, until two days after Christmas.

“What’s that smell?” I asked her on Tuesday the 27th as I sat in my office trying to get some work done. There was a faint but unpleasant odor near a vent between the office and the living room.

She couldn’t smell it, so I thought maybe it was just me and so I let it go for the time being.

The next day, the smell was a little worse — and concerning enough that I called the gas company. They got out here in less than an hour, and after doing their thing determined there was no leak.

Oh, and they let me actually smell the natural gas so I would know what it smelled like if we actually did have a leak.

It was actually worse than the “rotten eggs” smell they describe.

So it wasn’t a gas leak, thank goodness, but what was that awful smell?

They said they barely smelled anything and mom said it was still very faint to her as well.

So I started to wonder if something might be wrong with my sense of smell.

We had an HVAC technician at the house last Wednesday night. He couldn’t smell anything but went through the motions looking at this and that and getting in the crawl space under the house.

He found nothing out of the ordinary but suggested maybe we clean the carpet and get a vapor barrier put in – though the carpet doesn’t smell like at all.

That Saturday, we had another HVAC technician scheduled to come by for a winter maintenance check of the furnace. Though he couldn’t do the check at the time because it was raining, he did come to the house to do further investigation of the smell. He, too, said he could barely smell anything though he agreed there was smell somewhere that needed to be addressed

He went above and beyond the call of duty but also came up short on finding the source of the smell, which by Saturday was intolerable (but was still confined to the office, right there at the front of the house) to the point I told my mom we were going to have to leave the house for a few days until we could get the issue sorted out.

Our HVAC tech returned on Monday to install something called an “air scrubber,” which he said had a 75%-80% of eliminating the smell should it be coming through the ductwork (he had found no evidence of it where the smell was strongest but couldn’t sort through 100s of feet of ductwork).

We left my sister’s (where my nose had been unusually sensitive to all the candles that were lit, the hand soaps, and the flowery detergent used on the sheets) and came back to the house Tuesday afternoon of this week … and the smell was actually worse. Plus, I had a smell in my bedroom, too, different from the one in the office but definitely a smell. And it was another one that mom and I disagreed with as to what it smelled like (to her, it smells like clean air, like the scrubber is doing its job).

By that point, I was at my wit’s end after several days of mom’s life and mine being upended by this unknown smell.

My mom will soon be starting her chemo treatments, and I wanted this house to continue to be her sanctuary where she wouldn’t have to worry about smells or anything else, and where she could focus solely on getting better.

So after making some phone calls, a reputable critter removal company was recommended to me and they came out 12 hours later.

After investigating, the source of the smell was determined to be… a dead mouse. Not in the wall, but somewhere in the floor, which would be an expensive fix if the floor and all the insulation had to be torn out.

So the only other option was for the critter expert to “fog” under the house where the smell was to try and neutralize it until the dead mouse (RIP) and nature finally become one.

We took that option.

But I did ask the gentleman if it smelled strong to him as well. He said though there was definitely a smell to him it wasn’t super strong.

So the consensus from everyone that has come in the house over the last eight days has been “yes, there’s a smell” but none of them have thought it was nearly as bad as I thought it was.

To me, it was like the swamp version of Bath and Body Works. You walk in and it hits you like a ton of bricks.

So something I’ve learned through all this is that my sense of smell is very different than what it used to be, possibly yet another side effect from my August 2020 bout with COVID. I’ve read varying things about it, and plan on asking my doctor some questions about it because apparently there is such a thing as your smell senses changing and not always for the better. And that’s a little concerning to me.

In any event, there you have it. Not that I had it on my bingo card that my first story in 2023 would be about smells in the house, but here we are.

Flashback: Woke ‘Feminist’ Melts Down Over Diapers Locked up in Drug Stores and I Have Thoughts