What's that thing with smelling toast being a symptom of stroke?

[Gretch]

I was on the train with my boss today and we were chatting away and all of a sudden he said "I smell toast". So I said, "Oh no! What if you're having a stroke"?

He now thinks I'm totally nuts and that I made it up the smelling toast is a symptom of stroke! I swear I've read somewhere that smelling toast is a symptom of stroke!

I looked it up on WebMD but I couldn't find anything about toast.

Anyone know about this?

[post73]

[pelegurl]

i'm in nursing school and i haven't heard that before..

[3blindmice]

is it not an indicator for epileptic seizures? And it's the smell of burnt toast...you must have seen the same vignette as I did. :)

[poison ivy]

Funny, my mom complained the other day of smelling something....she couldn't explain what the odor smelled like. She said she'd get really strong 'wifs' of it...it wasn't her, it wasn't the furniture, it wasn't perfume,etc etc. No one else could smell it. It made me wonder if she was having some kind of weird medical thing.

BTW, I've never heard of that toast thing before. Weirdness!

[PrettiestRed]

I have heard about a phenomenon of people smelling *oranges* strongly right before either a seizure or an asthma attack (i can't quite remember which).

[Gretch]

I swear on a stack of bibles I read it some where. Or maybe I'm having a stroke!

I'm tellin' ya, every time I read about some medical condition on WebMD, I think I have it!!

[katz]

For some people, the first symptom of a seizure may be an aura. An aura is a form of simple partial seizure and is experienced as peculiar sensory or motor phenomenon. Auras have commonly been described as butterflies in the stomach, flashes of light, odd noises (buzzing in the ear), strange smells (burnt toast, rotten eggs), a powerful emotion or dizziness. When these occur, they are a good indication that a generalized seizure is about to occur.

http://epilepsyontario.org/client/EO/EOWeb.nsf/web/What+is+Epilepsy+(Children)

[Gretch]

Ok, I googled it and came up with this random live journal type website:

http://andrew.diaryland.com/cottoncandy.html

With this quote:
"So you know when you are about to have a stroke and you smell toast? Well maybe I'm getting some sickness where when you get it you smell cotton candy. And all I have to say to that is BRING THE DISEASE ON! I am all for cotton candy, and if I can't taste it, smelling it is good enough. So phantom cotton candy is okay by me!"

And then another random musing from this site: http://www.conclaveproject.org/members/7/archives/cat_scriptsstoriespoetry.php

"You just wait until I get my hands on a spoon!" cries a voice from behind him. He turns around to greet the source of the exclamation: his best friend, Beth. Beth is a junior of about 5'8" with blond hair and a secret crush on the Quaker Oats guy. She speaks with a distinctly Russian accent despite the fact that she's from Chicago. The most active supporter of Steve's Duck Duck Goose 2k cause, she delights in monkeyshines and bizarre, hare-brained schemes. Just last year, she spent a substantial portion of her summer attempting to create a toast-scented air freshener, giving up only after the majority of the subjects who tested the prototype went into a panic, fearing that they were having strokes. "How was I to know that smelling toast is a sign of a stroke?" she often remarks, "I'll bet there's some sort of disease out there that causes you to smell potpourri and then makes your brain explode or something like that. But they still make potpourri, don't they?"

[cold pressed olives]

For some people, the first symptom of a seizure may be an aura. An aura is a form of simple partial seizure and is experienced as peculiar sensory or motor phenomenon. Auras have commonly been described as butterflies in the stomach, flashes of light, odd noises (buzzing in the ear), strange smells (burnt toast, rotten eggs), a powerful emotion or dizziness. When these occur, they are a good indication that a generalized seizure is about to occur.

http://epilepsyontario.org/client/EO/EOWeb.nsf/web/What+is+Epilepsy+(Children)

that is really weird. and scary.

i am deathly afraid of seizures, i have seen friends have them as a result of too many drugs, sleep deprivation, allergic reactions...

does anybody here suffer from seizures?? what does it feel like? i think once my body went into shock, and i felt really weird right before it too. i didn't "feel right", if that makes sense. it might have been a small seizure, but i think it was shock.

ugh....

[Gretch]

does anybody here suffer from seizures?? what does it feel like?
I have epilepsy and I've had maybe three or four grand mal seizures in my life and I can't remember what happened during any of them. I can only remember feeling SO incredibly tired when I came to and totally disoriented. I felt like I'd been beaten up in a fist fight! I think its way scarier for the prson/people watching someone have a seizure than it is for the person who is actually having it.

I never smelled oranges or toast but I do recall the way things smelled as they came through my nose was strange - like there was some filter on my nose if that makes sense. I know that sounds kind of crazy, but I can't think of a better way to explain it!

[cold pressed olives]

I have epilepsy and I've had maybe three or four grand mal seizures in my life and I can't remember what happened during any of them. I can only remember feeling SO incredibly tired when I came to and totally disoriented. I felt like I'd been beaten up in a fist fight! I think its way scarier for the prson/people watching someone have a seizure than it is for the person who is actually having it.

I never smelled oranges or toast but I do recall the way things smelled as they came through my nose was strange - like there was some filter on my nose if that makes sense. I know that sounds kind of crazy, but I can't think of a better way to explain it!

see, i think it only qualifies as a seizure if you're unconsciouss, correct? i could be wrong. with my attack/episode, i was completely consciouss, but i felt really out of it and disoriented. and my pupils were kind of dilated and looked "crazy", like they weren't focusing on anything in particular. maybe it was shock. but it scared the hell out of me.

and i think you're right about people witnessing seizures...it is VERY scary! a friend of mine had one in the middle of a meal at a restaurant! it scared the shit out of me! luckily, there was a nurse at a nearby table who was able to assess the situation and calm her down AS WELL as me.

do you have to take medication for your seizures? if so, does it help?

eek! i am freaked out now. ;m

[Gretch]

see, i think it only qualifies as a seizure if you're unconsciouss, correct? i could be wrong. with my attack/episode, i was completely consciouss, but i felt really out of it and disoriented. and my pupils were kind of dilated and looked "crazy", like they weren't focusing on anything in particular. maybe it was shock. but it scared the hell out of me.

and i think you're right about people witnessing seizures...it is VERY scary! a friend of mine had one in the middle of a meal at a restaurant! it scared the shit out of me! luckily, there was a nurse at a nearby table who was able to assess the situation and calm her down AS WELL as me.

do you have to take medication for your seizures? if so, does it help?

eek! i am freaked out now. ;m
I'm not 100% sure if you have to be unconcious for it to qualify as a seizure. You could have had a seizure or maybe you or your body was feeling stressed and it was just a reaction to that. I still have muscle jerks that aren't epilepsy related.

As for medication, I used to take Epilim, then I took Lamictal (lamotragine) but I'm off those meds now because I've been seizure free for three years now.

When I was on medication I had 2 seziures but it was only because once I forgot to take my meds for a whole day and the second time was due to stress and not enough sleep when I was in college.

I know it's really scary because my friend Andy is a diabetic and he had a diabetic seizure last summer in the office and I saw it happen. Since I was the only one there that knew about seizures everyone expected me to do something. I took charge and preteded like I was cool but the truth is I was scared out of my mind. Since I never saw myself having a seizure, I never saw what it looked like. I just put him in recovery position and called an ambulance and tried to keep him as alert as possible after the seizure was over. It was very scary.

[Piku]

hee hee hee


Well, up here in Canada there used to be this little segment that would air on tv. I think it was a 'heritage moment' thing or something...that the doctor in it was Canadian.

Anyway, this woman would have seizures and just before she would smell burnt toast.

That's the big quote here..."I smell...burnt toast!" The woman who says it has an accent, so we would imitate it and say the line to each other at school and giggle.

Anyway, in the segment he performs surgery on her. Removes part of her skull (she's conscious) and touches parts of her brain until he finds the section where she says

"Dr. Penfield...I smell...burnt toast!"

So yeah. That's what I know about smelling burnt toast.

[Piku]

Go here! You can even watch it!

http://www.histori.ca/minutes/minute.do?ID=10211

[syvvie]

No, you don't have to be unconscious for it to be a seizure, as far as I know. My brother is epileptic and he has different types of seizures. He's had a couple of grand mal seizures that have caused him to lose consciousness, but he also has petit mal seizures. If you were to see him have a petit mal, you would just think he's really spaced/zoned out. He gets a far away, kind of dazed look in his eyes and doesn't respond. He says he can feel them coming on- his body starts to feel tense, he gets a weird buzzing feeling in his head, and sometimes, gets a metallic taste in his mouth ("like sucking on a penny" he says. I have no idea what causes that).

I've never heard of the toast/stroke thing, but I have heard that people with brain tumors sometimes smell things that aren't there.

[Southern Lad]

So what are you supposed to do when someone has a seizure? Can you die from one? Sorry, I am clueless.

My only experience was in 2nd grade, this girl had one in the cafeteria and we all thought it was from the hamburgers. Children are so stupid sometimes.

[Gretch]

So what are you supposed to do when someone has a seizure? Can you die from one? Sorry, I am clueless.

My only experience was in 2nd grade, this girl had one in the cafeteria and we all thought it was from the hamburgers. Children are so stupid sometimes.
Sometimes if the seizure is bad enough, the person can die, but usually if someone dies when they have a seizure it's either because they fell on something or hit their head on something or because they choke on saliva or their tongue.

If you're around someone who is having a seizure, try to keep them in recovery position (laying on the side with legs bent) that way the airway is clear and the tongue doesn't roll back in the throat. Don't put any thing in their mouth (some people say that you should put a finger in thier mouth to keep the tongue flat but if you do that you could get a nasty bite on your finger). Call an ambulance. While waiting for the ambulance to arrive, try to keep the victim responsive to you even if the response is just a moan or a grunt. After a seizure, the person will be totally out of it and most likely unable to speak properly. It's important to make them respond to you so you know they're consious.

[Slow Climb]

i've heard the burnt toast thing...i remember when i was younger, i thought it was cause your brain was burnt out or something.

i know that when i'm having a massive anxiety attack (the kind that result in losing consciousness) i smell something. i cannot describe it, it's nothing i've ever smelled before...but once in a while, very rarely, i'll be walking around and just get a teeeny tiny hint of that odor in my nose (i don't know why)...and it gives me chills. it's a distinct, bizarre odor, it makse my nose sweat.

[tully]

Go here! You can even watch it!

http://www.histori.ca/minutes/minute.do?ID=10211
oh gah!

HAHAHA!

that totally cracked my shit up!

"doktur pinfeeld .. the greatest kanadian alife!"

[Piku]

hehehehe

[Cold Fire]

I smell toast all the time when it doewsn't exist and I've never had a seizure or heard of it being to do with one.

Weird! What an odd symptom :p

~ Jess