Welcome to the weekly Perfume Chat Room, perfumistas! I envision this chat room as a weekly drop-in spot online, where readers may ask questions, suggest fragrances, tell others their SOTD, comment on new releases or old favorites, and respond to each other. The perennial theme is fragrance, but we can interpret that broadly. This is meant to be a kind space, so please try not to give or take offense, and let’s all agree to disagree when opinions differ. In fragrance as in life, your mileage may vary! YMMV.
Today is Friday, July 7, and I made sure to post on time today! What’s on my mind this week is fragrance of a different sort — our 11 year-old dog Lucy had not one, but two accidents in the house this week. We think it’s because of several recent thunderstorms, which made her reluctant to go outside. Usually she’s very good about sitting at the back door to ask to go out, but she’s scared of thunder and 1) didn’t want to go out; and 2) couldn’t hold it in. (That’s my theory, anyway. If it happens again soon, without thunder, we’ll take her to the vet). So here’s the fragrance issue: once a dog has peed somewhere, the odor will lead them to pee there again. Given that Lucy peed on our most expensive rug and on our son’s bed (!), it was imperative to get all traces of the pee out, even after cleaning enough that we couldn’t see or smell it any more. Dogs can.
Enzymes to the rescue! There are many rug cleaning products that use enzymes to break down urine molecules that are undetectable to us, but not to dogs. I used those thoroughly on everything I couldn’t launder, and they worked! How do I know? I bought a small flashlight-type device that emits black light, which shows dried pee stains as glowing spots in a dark room. No more glow spots on the rug or bedding! And now we come to the more pleasant fragrance issue: we’ve succeeded in the past helping Lucy through thunderstorms by putting a snug doggie sweater on her, but since dogs can sense thunder long before we can, we haven’t always been able to do that in time. So I’ve bought a diffuser that emits a vet-recommended synthetic pheromone; it mimics the scent of a mother dog and is supposed to calm adult dogs as well as puppies. To humans, it is odorless. We’ve just put it by her crate and I hope it helps. I hope it also helps retrain her to stay in her crate overnight without fussing — she had been doing that for years until 2020, when our kids all moved home and started letting her sleep on their beds.
Speaking of pheromones, I remember loving Marilyn Miglin’s fragrance of that name in the 1980s, and wearing it often. It was a green floral chypre (turns out I am very consistent over time in the kinds of fragrance I like). Apparently the current version isn’t nearly as good, not surprising given that the original was loaded with oakmoss at 1978 levels.
Do you have any thoughts on pheromones generally, or on that fragrance? Any words of wisdom for us in helping Lucy?
Serenity Now Scents and Sensibilities 
Poor Lucy! I’m sure she felt awful about her accidents. Our beagle only had a couple of accidents when away from home, off schedule, but he was afraid of thunderstorms. He would just shake. I found the enzyme cleaners effective. Hope the scent helps calm her. Today I’m participating in the NST CP for World Chocolate Day with Dame Chocolate+ from a sample. I layered over Tauer Wowilla oil to try to tame the heavy duty, straight up chocolate scent. Not really a summer combo!!
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Great idea to wear the Dame Chocolate! I’ve been outside gardening this morning, as it’s the only bearable time of day now that the heat and humidity (and afternoon thunderstorms) have really kicked in, so no SOTD yet. Will consider my options after a long, cool shower!
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Poor fur baby! I hope she’ll get that scare, and you won’t have to go to a vet.
On Monday, before the 4th of July, some idiots decided to test fireworks very close to our home (strictly forbidden in our area): it was loud, and poor Rusty didn’t know where to hide. It took me over half an hour of patting him (wrapped tight in my robe) to calm him down.
I was always skeptical about pheromones in perfumes and considered it a gimmick. But I guess it could work on dogs, if they can be synthesized properly and are stable. Tell us how/if it worked.
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Poor Rusty! It’s too soon to know re the diffuser, but another remedy I got for her is a calming oil that can be added to dry food. It has melatonin, and it’s flavored (apparently) like a combination of peanut butter and bacon. Lucy certainly gobbled it down (we’re expecting more thunderstorms later today), and she is settled for a nap in her daytime bed about ten feet from me, so let’s hope that helps too!
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Poor Lucy… I hope she turns out all right! One time during a storm, my brother’s dog went off into a spare bedroom and tore up all the bedding in a fit of anxiety. I didn’t know about the pheromones for dogs – interesting as it’s not a specific dog’s smell…
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Wow, I’m glad we were spared the shredded bedding. At least I’ve been able to launder everything so it won’t have to be replaced.
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We use the doggy calming diffuser around firework season as Jarvis is terrified of fireworks. It has worked well so far. Keeping it plugged in rather than turning it on once the noise has started seems to be most effective. I hope it works as well for Lucy as it has for Jarvis.
As for pheromone perfumes? I only recall so called pheromones being pushed at teenage boys in the 70’s as “panty droppers”. They we cheap & nasty. Teenagers now have Lynx (Axe in the US) & men, who should really know better, have Aventus.
Saying that on a personal note, my knickers have never fallen down in response to a scent, pheromonal or not 😉
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lol, my son went through the obligatory Axe phase briefly, then I managed to switch him over to Davidoff’s Cool Water, which is so much better and which he can afford to buy himself!
And I agree, the idea that a scent would compel a human female to drop her knickers is ludicrous. Also misogynistic.
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Some of the “panty droppers” need renaming “supergluers”.
Imagine if women openly asked for suggestions for “boxer breakers”?
Firstly, other women would rapidly call you out on the error of your ways.
Sadly, many men would quite happily “break” their own boxers & send the evidence on the socials.
Therein lies the mystery of Venus & Mars 🤣
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lol! So true!
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Sorry OH, got no helpful ideas for your fur baby. We had the same thunder problem with Jinx, who has now gone. It really terrified him, as did fireworks.
Reads like you’re doing everything you can.
No, I never smelt Pheromone the perfume but remember how much the sciences were touted as I was growing up.
Portia x
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