This is why I think long term outcomes vary widely for people with this condition - this is the most hopeful thing you will ever read about TMAU

 

DISCLAIMER:  I am not a doctor or medical professional of any kind, and nothing here is medical advice.  

So, I have been thinking for a while now about the long term life outcomes for people with this condition, and if they vary widely. My conclusion is that they likely vary in a truly dramatic way based on whether or not someone is able to find love, get married and have their own family, or if they are completely cut off from this. Most people posting here are young, and I don't think most people understand how what matters to them will change as they get older, in dramatic ways. It is certainly possible to understand this at a young age though. I understood it as soon as the unimaginable reality of this situation dawned on me at 18, and why I knew I needed a cure, which I was incredibly fortunate to receive through major dietary change. This is a long post, but I think its well worth taking the time to read, since the topics it covers are so important.

For most people, in the long term the most important thing is getting married and having their own family. If you read about people with TMAU you find that some people are able to do this, and others are not. I am a male who cured my problem about 20 years ago, and I am going to focus mostly on females for post. The male version is more difficult, and I will address it at the end. Some females with this condition go on to get married, and others find that only 'the worst of the worst' guys are attracted to them, and stop dating completely at a young age.

The typical story for someone with a serious disability or other issue that gets them mistreated in high school is that everything changes for the better in a dramatic way as soon as they start college. Part of the tragedy of TMAU is that this is almost never the case (based on every single story I have read), and most people report that college is worse than high school, and the workplace is worse still.

Now, somewhere around the age of 30 and older, when people usually start getting married and having kids, people with TMAU have the opportunity to see major changes in their life. If you are able to get married and have your own family, this is how your life will change in a dramatically positive way compared to your high school & college experience. This is how you overcome this and live a full and normal life in spite of it. This is how you get the last laugh on everyone who mistreated you when you were younger. This is especially true if you do better in this area than they do!

If you do not date because of this condition, then you will likely not overcome your situation, and your mature adult life will look like your high school existence, except worse. I am talking about the difference between living a full and normal life - in the ways that truly count - and living a meaningless, pointless life of suffering. The kind of superficial things that seem to mean everything at 19 will mean nothing 20+ years later. The ability to attend concerts in person and things like that is not going to improve when you get older - but it will mean much less to you.

If you are not able to control your condition, then you will likely never be able to be comfortable around strangers in indoor public places. When talking about finding a partner, you just need ONE person who tolerates your condition well. The idea of discussing your condition with your partner should be an intimate thing, rather than the humiliating thing it would be to discuss with strangers and work colleagues.

The second part of having a good long term outcome is getting a remote job, so that you are not dealing with the accumulated weight of years and then decades of bad reactions to you. If you read about the lives of people 50+ with this condition, the common theme is being completely worn down by reactions and comments, and never getting used to it. A remote job is the way to avoid this. An outdoor lifestyle, rather than one based around activities that require being around strangers indoors, is also important. So you want to look at hiking, kyaking, cycling and things like that, rather than big city hobbies where you need to be around strangers in close quarters.

I read a comment here once that went something like 'we all have the same story, and it sucks'. When people are young that is likely the case, but I as I said, I think that when people get older, peoples stories vary in truly dramatic ways based on whether or not they are able to find love, get married, and have their own families. This is the most important thing in the lives of most people, and its possible to do this with this condition. The one bright spot of this condition is that this is still doable, and this is the most important thing there is for most people.

I would have been very skeptical about this being at all realistic, but the stories of people with this condition who have done this are all over the place. I remember being quite (pleasantly) surprised back in 2005 when I made some posts on a Yahoo group that was just like this forum, and reading about (this was about a 95% female group) women getting ready for their weddings, ect., in spite of not being able to cure themselves. So the thing that sounds really impossible with this condition is actually quite possible - and its the most important thing there is. If you think this is some kind of divine curse, think about that.

There is no way to know what percentage of females with this condition get married, and what percentage don't date at all, but it sounds like the second group is larger than the first. The bottom line is to make finding a partner your highest priority. Advice saying to not even worry about this until your late 20's was NOT designed with people with out of control body odor disorders in mind.

You have a huge challenge to overcome to make this happen with this condition, and so this needs to be a top priority in all the decisions you make, as far as socialization opportunities. This is what should motivate you to engage in social activities you would otherwise skip. I think being willing to endure bad partners who were attracted to you for bad reasons may be key, in order to make this work. You might need to be willing to 'kiss a lot of frogs', but key your eye on the end game.

As I said, I am a male, but I think I can give some advice on going about this, and I think the fact that I am a male myself can be helpful here. I think the way to find a partner is to make some friends with guys in the hopes that one will ask you out. This also allows you to carefully screen potential partners to make sure that you are avoiding the 'worst of the worst' types, who might be drawn to you. You need to carefully look for evidence of the moral character of the guy. You can't trust what he says to you, so you need to look elsewhere for this evidence.

I think the big danger is a guy who isn't actually interested in a relationship with you, but thinks you have limited dating options, and just wants to use you for sex. You need to look for evidence of the guy's moral character to avoid this - guys ARE aware that this is a morally wrong thing to do, but they often don't understand just how wrong it is.

One of the reasons that girls don't ask guys out is that the guy might not be interested, but would realize that a sexual opportunity was being offered, and would date you anyway for that. You would think you were in a real relationship while he was just using you for sex. By having the guy ask out the girl, there is a barrier he has to cross, which greatly reduces this. So the guy asks out a girl he actually wants a relationship with. If you are a female with TMAU, the guy may perceive that the barrier to dating you is very low, and you may get the same dynamic that would happen if females asked out males.

Now, for males its much harder to follow this basic path since you have to ask the girl out, and that likely seems unthinkable with this condition. This is the big reason why I knew I needed nothing less than a total cure, which I was incredibly fortunate to have gotten. I have heard about males with this condition getting married though. A post on another forum from a man facing terrible mistreatment from work colleagues in a factory over his condition, but who is married with a kid stands out. He did not say how he got married with his condition in the post.

I have been in contact with a male sufferer from Japan where was treated terribly (the diet I followed is working very well for him now thankfully), as people in Japan are hypersensitive to bad smells. So, he met a girl online and they met up in person, and he assumed she would never want to see him again...but she did and they married about a year later when he was only about 22. This is in a country where even normal people have a very hard time getting married.

Here is my guess about how males getting married with TMAU usually happens: they make friends with a female who tolerates them well, and to their shock they start developing feelings for them and sense the feeling is mutual. So, even if dating sounds unthinkable, because females seem so intolerant of this condition in males, just try making female friends and see what happens.

Now, I suspect that most males are not able to date and get married with this condition. I hear about this happening far less often then with females. Whenever I hear a list of female turn-offs in men, any kind of bad smell always makes the list. I think that making female friends is really the way to go for this. I think things like dating apps are going to lead to terrible, and humiliating situations, but if you can endure that, then try it. You need to explain very quickly that you have a medical condition if she notices a smell, its key to establish this is not a hygiene issue.

This goes for both males and females with this condition - if a potential partner thinks a smell is coming from poor hygiene, they will feel much more justified in cutting you off than if you explain this is a medical condition.

Now, everything above is based around straight people. If you are part of the LGBT community, there is not enough out there in terms of stories of people dating/marrying to give advice, beyond pure speculation. There could be stories that I simply have not read. Hopefully there will be shared understanding about being part of a marginalized community, but you will have to be a pioneer and experiment to see what happens.

So, the idea that everyone with TMAU has a similar life is likely only true when people are young. When people reach the age where marriage and starting a family becomes common, peoples lives start varying in quality in profound ways, based on whether they get married and have their own family, or if they are completely cut off from this. For females especially, having a child is usually the most profound part of their lives, but there are major cautions with this:

Now, on the topic of having children, I have read many stories of parents passing this condition down to a child. Its usually a mother passing it down to their daughter, just from the stories I have read on forums. This is what I would expect, since this is at least an 80% female condition. You will not be able to protect any children you have from the ravages of the world if they inherit this from you. There is no way to know the precise likelihood of a parent passing this down to their child, and this is unfortunate given how important that topic is. I think a reasonable person can conclude that the risks are unacceptably high.

It is for this reason that I have to VERY strongly urge no one to have biological children if they are not able to actually control their own condition to the point of being able to live a normal life. I have debated whether or not to make this entire post, because what if people ignore this advice, and more suffering is brought into the world as a result? Now, having said that, if you have children who inherit TMAU, they could follow the same life path that you followed, and remote work and school is available, which changes things in fundamental ways.

The topic of this post could fill a book, and this is just a basic overview of the issue, that I wrote in one (long) sitting. If you have actual experience with the topics above, in terms of dating, marriage, and having children PLEASE weigh in below in a reply. You don't need to be a member of this subreddit to post here, and everyone would greatly appreciate you making a free Reddit account if you don't have one, so that you can add some information about this vital issue.

I want to be clear that I solved this condition for myself by the time I finished high school, and lived a normal life after that, with some dietary restrictions. What this means is that everything above is ultimately speculative, and based on educated guesses that I think are well founded. It is NOT based on my actual life experience, since I had this problem fixed prior to turning 19. It is really important that everyone reading understands this, if they are going to try and follow the path I have laid out here. I think my conclusions add up, but they are ultimately based on doing analysis and thinking about things. I am not describing an actual path I followed here. See my profile for the diet I followed, if you want the actual path I followed.

One more related topic: why does it seems like most people here are so young? This is not some new issue like social media addiction, this is something that has been around for all of human history. So, the age demographics of sufferers should match that of the general population. My conclusion is that the typical person with this condition goes through a period of up to several years when they are young when they search for a cure. They usually conclude it can't be cured through the home remedies/OTC supplements available at some point and accept they must live their life with this. This is why they are not usually posting comments about supplements, ect., since they are no longer in that stage.

There is something deeply eeire and concerning about the lack of elderly people with this condition that I have heard about. Why have I never heard about an 80 year old with TMAU? What is the typical effect of many decades of dealing with this condition - other than for people who can cure it? The truth is that I don't think anyone really knows what usually happens to people with this condition in the very long term (60, 70, 80 years old). Every comment I have read on youtube or elsewhere about a sufferer over the age of 50 has described a very bad situation. The accumulated effect of decades of mistreatment and reactions wearing them down is the common theme. So, I am very concerned about what will ultimately happen to the mostly young people posting here, in the decades to come. As soon as I learned just how serious and usually unfixable this situation was, I had visions of myself being elderly and looking back on my life.

The key to dealing with this is have a long term, life-long view of dealing with this situation. Getting a remote job and finding a lifestyle than does not require being around strangers indoors is key. I think that finding love, getting married, and then carefully thinking about starting your own family is the real key though, as I made the case for here. I think that this will allow for a full and real life to be had with this condition. This should be enough to make the very long term future (60, 70, 80 years old) something to look forward to. Everyone thinks that people here understand living with TMAU, but really, most people understand living in a very early phase of life with it. This post was all about trying to understand the issue in a much more long term kind of way.