Hi
I thought Id introduce myself. My name is Matt and Im from Liverpool. Ive registered on here because I think I may have TMAU. I wont give you my life story but I will mention just a few things to see if it resonates with anyone. In December 1992 I was a twenty one year old, sitting in a college class when one of my friends suddenly held his hand to his face and asked me if I had farted. I could not smell anything. It happened in the next class a day or so later with the same reaction from him and a couple of other mates who made a joke of it. But I began to panic because I could detect nothing and I had no awareness that I had broken wind. Over the next couple of weeks and then into months I began to experience this more and more and I would gradually be terrified to go into a closed environment unless I was at home. I tried medicines but nothing seemed to help. In the September of 1993 I started at University but the same thing happened and I dropped out at xmas. Over the next few years I experienced these feelings of fear and a smell of rotten eggs that I could not detect......I tried many diet exclusions and also suffered from bullimia.
At the worst my symptoms would be a foul gas which could manifest itself quite frequently in a short period of time....it seemed to be intermittent. Only on two occasions in the last twenty years have I been able to detect anything. In recent years it seems to have happened a lot less for which I am grateful and I try to adhere to the maxim of "one day at a time"....I eat certain foods and dont eat other foods which seemed to make things worse. I do not eat at all during the daytime when I am in work...i know this is wrong but it is a kind of comfort blanket for me. I also poo each and every morning....again a sort of mental thing to "cleanse" my system. Looks and whispers and stares and people telling me I smell happen to be a lot less...The worst period was pre millenium and in fact it has only been mentioned to me twice in the last three years.....on both occasions i feel certain I was responsible because i could detect nothing. So although I am not "cured", I am in a better place compared to the young man of twenty years ago. I do not know if my story has any familiarity to anyone or even if I have this official TMAU illness. I do know that I saw a bowel specialist twenty years ago and the guy just laughed in my face when I presented my problem.
Anyway....I may be in the wrong place but if nothing else I offer my support to anyone who is living with this because I can still feel the fear that I felt whenever it happened....and still may do in the future. Best wishes. Matt