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Dear Prudence: Office perfume etiquette
Q. Office perfume etiquette: I work in a small office with about 12 other people, all women except one man. It’s a small space and as the front desk admin, I have to interact with everyone throughout the day. I unfortunately get frequent migraines (averaging 2 per week), which are very painful and challenging to deal with. They happen so often that I can’t use my sick days to get through them, so I’m regularly in pain at work. Over the past two years I’ve tried working with a doctor to lessen these attacks, to no avail.
My problem is that my migraines are sometimes triggered, and certainly aggravated, by perfume and other chemical scents. About five of the women in my office wear strong and heavy perfume every day. I can’t avoid my co-workers and am not able to close a door to cut myself off from the parade of competing floral and powder scents that waft past me every few minutes. What can I do to deal with this in a respectful, effective way? I’ve explained my problem to a few of the women and asked, very kindly and apologetically, if they could wear less perfume to the office, but none of them have made the effort to do so. One woman started wearing more instead! I feel like a jerk for dictating such a personal habit to people I have to get along with every day. But I’m in agony, and it’s driving me insane. Please help!
A: How awful that one of your co-workers responded to your request by wearing more perfume than before—that’s baffling, unnecessary, and cruel. I feel like there’s been a cultural tipping point over the last few years, and most people are at least aware that sensitivity to perfumes and colognes can be a pretty common migraine trigger. I’m sorry that asking individuals politely hasn’t helped. I think your next move needs to be talking to your boss and HR, if you have an HR department. Framing this as a medical issue (and a workplace productivity issue—you can’t be useful as a front desk admin if you’re at home or on the verge of passing out) will hopefully get some weight behind your request.
Has anyone had luck getting co-workers hooked on perfume to cut down? Do signs help? Air purifiers tucked behind the desk? Let us know.
My problem is that my migraines are sometimes triggered, and certainly aggravated, by perfume and other chemical scents. About five of the women in my office wear strong and heavy perfume every day. I can’t avoid my co-workers and am not able to close a door to cut myself off from the parade of competing floral and powder scents that waft past me every few minutes. What can I do to deal with this in a respectful, effective way? I’ve explained my problem to a few of the women and asked, very kindly and apologetically, if they could wear less perfume to the office, but none of them have made the effort to do so. One woman started wearing more instead! I feel like a jerk for dictating such a personal habit to people I have to get along with every day. But I’m in agony, and it’s driving me insane. Please help!
A: How awful that one of your co-workers responded to your request by wearing more perfume than before—that’s baffling, unnecessary, and cruel. I feel like there’s been a cultural tipping point over the last few years, and most people are at least aware that sensitivity to perfumes and colognes can be a pretty common migraine trigger. I’m sorry that asking individuals politely hasn’t helped. I think your next move needs to be talking to your boss and HR, if you have an HR department. Framing this as a medical issue (and a workplace productivity issue—you can’t be useful as a front desk admin if you’re at home or on the verge of passing out) will hopefully get some weight behind your request.
Has anyone had luck getting co-workers hooked on perfume to cut down? Do signs help? Air purifiers tucked behind the desk? Let us know.
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As far as I know, this hasn't caused any shortage of patients.
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Me too!
I once had to cancel an appointment with a medical professional (a podiatrist) as she had gone to a perfume store at lunch time and generously applied samples to her arms... fortunately they didn't make me pay for the appointment.
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I can say from experience that getting a letter from your doctor can be a critical step in going to HR or your boss. I don't know if this would technically be covered under ADA or a similar act, but having a definite medical diagnosis is always helpful.
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I think this question struck me in particular because there was a (recently retired and gone away, thank goodness!) man in my workplace (het, white, southern US) who seemed so weirdly fixated on wearing a lot of strong perfume for years, even when--and maybe even especially after--being repeatedly asked to stop!
He did rapid fitness walks around the building floor every day. And after his walks, he would go into the conference room (!) to change, instead of the restroom. And as he was changing back into his work clothes, he'd apply a large amount of perfume.
And you know how perfume is--he put on so much, and it not only stuck to him in a large cloud, but also hung in the air like a stinging miasma. I luckily don't have scent allergies or intolerances, but even I could barely stand being anywhere near his work area. PLUS, then we'd sometimes all have to go into that conference room to call into a meeting on speakerphone, and the entire little room would just reek.
And the thing is, someone else who works here actually has migraines, which can be scent triggered! So she couldn't attend those meetings and in fact would have to retreat to her office, which is as far from his work area as you can get.
They had worked together for years and years; she had asked him at least to wear less. And he'd agreed! But then even if he had dialed it down for a brief moment, it would always come reeking back.
If he had no sense of smell, or got "nose-blindness" from existing in a constant cloud of strong scent, at the very least he could have simmered down or stopped when someone said HEY FERGUS COULD YOU PLEASE NOT BECAUSE I GET ACTUAL MIGRAINES AND SOMETIMES HAVE TO USE SICK TIME TO GO HOME.
And yet! He did not! Eventually our new supervisor spoke to him about it, or so she said. And yet! He did not! And never would she escalate it higher, to male upper management; nor did my migranous coworker ever feel able to escalate it herself, to try filing a health-related complaint etc. Meaning that it was left to individuals to keep trying to ask him nicely, and also that everyone who ever spoke to him about it was a woman. I am sure his complete rejection of constant perforce-"nice" input from women was COMPLETE COINCIDENCE.
We were only finally spared his eye-watering terror when he finally retired. The joy of wishing him goodbye was honest and sincere, and entirely for our own benefit. I hope he tripped on his way home and drowned in a roadside vat of potent perfume. >:[
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The boss similarly would not escalate it or make it a condition of employment.
I didn't get it.
Finally, the stinky colleague...who the boss had provided considerable support for while he was in grad school, in the hope that Stinky Colleague would use his professional qualifications to the benefit of our business, once he finished obtaining them? Took off for another workplace.
I wasn't sorry to see him go. I wasn't even all that sorry for Boss. The new guy we hired was much nicer and didn't give me headaches.
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At a previous job I had a coworker who would go out to smoke and then coat herself in this awful floral cloud. When I asked her to at least not come stand in front of my face where I couldn't avoid it, she also doubled down, as well as trying to "trick" me and the other asthmatic person by saying she'd worn different perfume or something as if my lungs were not paying sufficient attention. Boss even talked to her about it but nothing happened.
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(Much as many people interpret "please tell me if that contains wheat so I don't get sick" as "I am a special hipster foodie snowflake Goop-addict who makes up fake health issues to get double sriracha." People used to be the same way about peanuts and cigarettes, but it seems the overton window has shifted sufficiently on those.)
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I don't know whether ADA or another law covers migraines. I'm lucky that it didn't come up: my company has a policy of providing medically necessary accommodations even when there isn't a legal obligation. Requiring a doctor's letter helps them keep such a policy because it avoids putting HR in the awkward position of adjudicating what constitutes a medical necessity. HR considers something to be a medical necessity when a certified medical professional says it is.
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