How to safely dull taste buds?

[Tayh]

So I'm screwed huh?, so there'd be no chance of me being normal?

You *are* normal.
Maybe it isn't that you have "super" taste buds.
Maybe you just had poor friends, or were the target of bullies who looked for any way to hurt you.

There's nothing unnatural or unusual about enjoying food that tastes well.
So, harsh as it may sound, maybe just get over it? Or at least talk with a professional therapist about it first before you do any irrevocable harm to yourself.

 

[DarklordKyo]

You *are* normal.
Maybe it isn't that you have "super" taste buds.
Maybe you just had poor friends, or were the target of bullies who looked for any way to hurt you.

There's nothing unnatural or unusual about enjoying food that tastes well.
So, harsh as it may sound, maybe just get over it? Or at least talk with a professional therapist about it first before you do any irrevocable harm to yourself.

As mentioned previously in this thread, therapists aren't really an option. Everyone who tried to "help" me just wanted to throw me in the loony bin. Eventually, I just stopped bothering.

On top of that, for some reason, my brain just likes to spontaneously replay bad memories. Just "getting over it" isn't exactly an option.

Sorry if I sounded like an asshole saying those, btw.

 

[Just Ebola]

Also, how would it be fascinating?

How would it not be fascinating? I remember reading Ripley's accounts of a man who cut off his toes as a hobby, when I was a kid. Somehow a tongue feels much more intimate.

As an aside, I listed a few of the problems with using Novocain, and I thought it was implied that I give it a solid 'do not recommend'. No need to poke further holes in it, that well is tapped. Novo-cain is novo-Bueno.

So I'm screwed huh?, so there'd be no chance of me being normal?


...crap...

But you're not! You're just in the same boat as the other roughly 7 billion of us. You still haven't explained why this is so important to you, and I'm sure we're all curious. If it turns out you have a super good reason, and the person who chastised you said the most loathsome insult in human history, I could really get behind this whole anti-tastebud endeavor of yours. Get me a labcoat and whiteboard and I'll be your anchorman, we'll probably have a cure for taste before lunch.

 

[DarklordKyo]

But you're not! You're just in the same boat as the other roughly 7 billion of us. You still haven't explained why this is so important to you, and I'm sure we're all curious. If it turns out you have a super good reason, and the person who chastised you said the most loathsome insult in human history, I could really get behind this whole anti-tastebud endeavor of yours. Get me a labcoat and whiteboard and I'll be your anchorman, we'll probably have a cure for taste before lunch.

Appreciate the levity, but it's unnecessary.

 

[Tayh]

As mentioned previously in this thread, therapists aren't really an option. Everyone who tried to "help" me just wanted to throw me in the loony bin. Eventually, I just stopped bothering.

Okay.
I'm going to be THAT asshole.
If everyone is saying the same thing, maybe there's something about it? Wanting to inflict permanent harm on yourself, solely because of the opinion of a few others, is not sign of a healthy mind.
You have to admit that you have a problem before you can treat that problem.

I'd be willing to wager that most peoples' brains replay bad memories for them. Yours just happen to be about food/eating.
I have bad memories too. Sometimes they keep me awake at night when I try to go asleep. "Oh, why couldn't it have gone differently?" Well, it didn't, it's in the past now, and there's nothing I can do about it. I'm not going to let it control my life going forwards.

Anyway, if you won't accept professional therapy, maybe you could start smoking or eating a lot of spicy food? Smoking is, as far as I've heard, proven to dull tastebuds and/or sense of smell.
Strong spices, such as chili, does also apparently dull your tastebuds, eventually, according to my South-American father who's eaten chili in his food for his entire life.

 

[Just Ebola]

But you're not! You're just in the same boat as the other roughly 7 billion of us. You still haven't explained why this is so important to you, and I'm sure we're all curious. If it turns out you have a super good reason, and the person who chastised you said the most loathsome insult in human history, I could really get behind this whole anti-tastebud endeavor of yours. Get me a labcoat and whiteboard and I'll be your anchorman, we'll probably have a cure for taste before lunch.

Appreciate the levity, but it's unnecessary.

Oh, you thought I was joking? I've been known to weave a bit of light-heartedness into my speech, but don't mistake that for me being dismissive.

I take a very laizzes faire stance when it comes to personal freedoms, so if you say you want to disable your sense of taste, I don't assume it's a joke. Unless this is a cry for help or a joke, I want to see a burnt fucking tongue.

Is doing so the act of a mentally stable man? No. But you've already said you've dismissed the idea of getting professional help, so that leaves you with no recourse.

Will you get over it, or go through with it? Regardless of what you choose, I want some closure on this, and I'd like to see what you settle on.

 

[Addendum_Forthcoming]

Take up smoking, it impairs taste eventually. Won't kill taste but supposedly it blunts it a bit. Relatively safe.

The secondary benefit is nicotine cuts hunger, also.

 

[Frankster]

Goku wanting to dull his taste buds, jeez what has this world come to?

Seriously man, don't do it is all I can say.

Also I can't help but question the bit about psychiatrists wanting to send you to the looney bin just because of what you describe. This isn't the 1920s anymore, and for american psychiatrists in particular to want to do that instead of giving you meds that aren't really an effective solution and in fact makes you somewhat reliant on them but keep them in business makes me VERY suspicious there's aspects of this story you're not telling us.

In meantime, the above advice of taking up smoking (as horrible as it sounds to advise people to develop a bad habit, and I say this as a smoker myself) or dulling your buds through regular consumption of spicy food is probably the least extreme answer you will get.

 

[Satinavian]

Yes. And do you know, how your memory compensates for it ? By replacing the the taste bud information with memories about how things should taste. So that doesn't help you at all. It will actually make things worse as you will be stuck with your eating preferences.
Taste buds are important to chance those preferences.

So I'm screwed huh?, so there'd be no chance of me being normal?

There is the option of training/learning.

If you eat stuff for a long time again and again as main component of your diet, your brain will learn eventually that this is proper food. At least if you don't get ill during this time.

 

[Saetha]

Throw me in with the "This is a bad idea" camp. Besides, having literally no sense of taste would probably make you LESS normal, not more. If the issue here is that you're one of those super-tasters or... whatever they're called, put it to use! Some of the best cooks and food critics have a heightened sense of taste.

Sure, I'd love to spend thousands of dollars on a worthless degree. Sure, I'd love training in a discipline that will find me no work.

Sorry if I sounded like an asshole, but I have no interest in a culinary career path for those reasons.

Restaurants need chefs, bruh. And there are plenty of restaurants around.

And not to be a jerk, but... I mean, if multiple professionals suggested you seek help, even institutionalized help, maybe it was a good suggestion? There's nothing wrong with tending to your mental health.

 

[Cowabungaa]

Taste buds dull with age anyways, so why not speed up the process? Besides, I just want to be normal. I don't want to be a spoiled, stuck up little shit who refuses anything less than Wendys if I wanted fast food.

Shit dude, there's no such thing as absolute normalcy. What's your deal? And how is refusing most fast food even a bad thing?! Fuck that greasy shit yo. And if you want to be normal so bad, doing something like this is the exact opposite of normal. So deal with it, enjoy it and actually be normal. There's nothing abnormal about having a strong sense of taste.

If you're really serious and you want to do this because a few people are dicks to you, sheesh, yeah I too will recommend you talk to a professional instead of mulling this over regardless of whether they want to 'throw you in the loony bin' or not. Hell maybe that's exactly a good idea to get institutionalized for a bit if you're seriously overthink self-mutilation.

 

[BeeGeenie]

I'm still not understanding the logic of why you think not being able to taste your food would help you. If you truly "love" food, you shouldn't want to destroy your ability to enjoy it. Being a supertaster is considered a normal genetic variation, and as such, there is no treatment. You ARE normal.

I'm sorry, but it sounds like you should just talk to a mental health professional about developing a more healthy attitude about it, and/or finding a way to cope with criticism... Although it sounds like you also need someone to help you develop a better attitude about mental health professionals.

 

[Phasmal]

Yeah put me down in the 'Maybe try more therapy' camp.

Admittedly I know little about America, but over here you have to do something fucking drastic to wind up in a 'loony bin'.

 

[Scarim Coral]

You are aware that if you lose your taste bud, you would loose the ability to taste bad food right?

Sure they could be an upside like tasting a person burned cooked meal but let's be realistic. A food taste bad is a warming send to your brain that you may or may not want to eat it. Imagine if you ingest an out of date food despite it look ok at apperance. Sure you will say you just keep a look out on the food dates and apperance but doesn't means appealing food will taste appealing. Even if you're fine eating bad food doesn't mean your stomach will want to keep it in and out throught the natural way.

Even then I can't remember the exact science and biology but since taste is linked to smell, would you also destroy your sense of smell aswell?

 

[Calico_Asshole]

There is no safe way to do that, and as others have tried to explain to you, it would leave an unsafe result. Worse, your sense of smell and retrolfaction are far more critical in the perception of complex flavors than your tongue, which really does only the basics. Your tongue is far more about telling you quickly if you're eating poison than enjoy much. If you've ever had a bad cold, or allergies, you know this all too well. Worse, you may have found, not an inability to taste, but an altered taste that made things disgusting.

This would be an insane thing to do, a very permanent and dangerous kind of desperate self-harm that I would compare to someone in pain asking how to sever their ability to sense discomfort. It's a reason for you to see someone to help you achieve your goals without harming yourself, and if need be, to address this desire to harm yourself at its root.

All of that being said, since I don't believe in mothering people, the ways that people lose sensitivity to tastes in the normal course of life are:

Excessive smoking and alcohol consumption, lots of excessively spicy foods, and after a couple of decades you'll have a leather tongue. And your liver and lungs will be screwed, so you won't have to worry about your eating anymore; a bit like curing depression with a shotgun to the head.

You are aware that if you lose your taste bud, you would loose the ability to taste bad food right?

Sure they could be an upside like tasting a person burned cooked meal but let's be realistic. A food taste bad is a warming send to your brain that you may or may not want to eat it. Imagine if you ingest an out of date food despite it look ok at apperance. Sure you will say you just keep a look out on the food dates and apperance but doesn't means appealing food will taste appealing and even then, if you fine eating bad food doesn't mean your stomach will want to keep it in and out the natural way.

Even then I can't remember the exact science and biology but since taste is linked to smell, would you also destroy your sense of smell aswell?

Yes, and the part of your body responsible is actually part of your brain that exits in little tendrils through the cribiform place in your skull. Needless to say, you don't want to go attacking this willy nilly.

 

[Saetha]

Yeah put me down in the 'Maybe try more therapy' camp.

Admittedly I know little about America, but over here you have to do something fucking drastic to wind up in a 'loony bin'.

It's possible to be involuntarily admitted to a psych ward - but to do that you have to be clearly and violently insane. "A danger to yourself and others" insane. Otherwise admittance is completely voluntary, so if someone tells you to go there and you don't respond by violently attacking them, you can probably go "Nah" and go about your life.

 

[DefunctTheory]

The safest way to dull your sense of taste is to chain smoke two or three packs of cigarettes a day.

You can mull that over for a bit. The safest way to do what you want is to bait lung cancer.

Have fun.

 

[DarklordKyo]

Yeah put me down in the 'Maybe try more therapy' camp.

Admittedly I know little about America, but over here you have to do something fucking drastic to wind up in a 'loony bin'.

Need I mention that those happened when I was in Elementary school?

 

[DarklordKyo]

Restaurants need chefs, bruh. And there are plenty of restaurants around.

And not to be a jerk, but... I mean, if multiple professionals suggested you seek help, even institutionalized help, maybe it was a good suggestion? There's nothing wrong with tending to your mental health.

Need I mention that those happened when I was in Elementary school?

 

[DarklordKyo]

I'm still not understanding the logic of why you think not being able to taste your food would help you. If you truly "love" food, you shouldn't want to destroy your ability to enjoy it. Being a supertaster is considered a normal genetic variation, and as such, there is no treatment. You ARE normal.

I'm sorry, but it sounds like you should just talk to a mental health professional about developing a more healthy attitude about it, and/or finding a way to cope with criticism... Although it sounds like you also need someone to help you develop a better attitude about mental health professionals.

Need I mention that those happened when I was in Elementary school? On top of that, isn't listening to criticism a good thing? Isn't it bad if people get offended by criticism?