I'm a supertaster. You might be one too; about one in four people is a supertaster. We have more taste buds than the average, so our senses of smell and taste are more keen - sometimes *considerably* more keen.
That's not always a good thing. In my case, I was constantly reproached and mocked for being a picky eater. It caused me quite a bit of grief. It wasn't until much later in life that I found out that there was a physical cause for what I (and the rest of my family) had always assumed was because I was "difficult".
Some supertasters really suffer a lot. Perfumes can be unbearable for them (personally I like perfume). They can be incredibly limited in what they can eat, even more than I was.
On the other hand, there can be plusses, too. I often find it hard to understand how normal tasters can miss out on so much of their environment. For me, the world is *filled* with interesting smells. Sometimes I wonder if in that regard I'm a bit more like a dog or cat!
My sense of taste and smell have been a huge help with cooking. I'm a pretty good cook; I like to experiment and develop new recipes.
Also I could never stand the taste of alcohol. My family used to try to sneak alcohol into my drinks sometimes, but I always detected it instantly. I don't know if I would have had any tendency towards alcoholism (the rest of my family likes to drink, except for my son), but I think it's safe to say that I'm never going to find out.
I also seem to be highly resistant to the effects of alcohol. My ex-wife once twisted my arm to drink three glasses of wine in a row; they had no effect at all. Medications are the same way; after surgery once I was given a triple dose of Percodan. It had absolutely no effect, and the doctors were stunned. They said even an elephant would have felt the dose they gave me.
Anyway, if you're curious about the phenomenon of supertasting you can read about it here.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supertaster
There's a simple test you can do to find out if you're a supertaster, but if you ARE one, you'll probably already know it on some level.
