Sense of smell never returns....:(
Although, just to be contrary, I have an extremely acute sense of taste.
The docs argued that it can't be so, but it is.
The best I can figure is that some "link" between the act of "smelling" and "perceiving" a smell is broken or damaged.
I do, however, know 2 other brain injury survivors who have neither sense of taste or smell.
Weird, but true.
it all depends on what gets damaged.
the sense of smell goes straight into the Limbic, bypassing any initial processing. If that straight routing is damaged, that's all she wrote.
similarly, if the right eye's optic nerve is severed before the hypothalamic cross, that's all she wrote. However, if it is severed between the cross and the occipital lobe, some of the right eye's data will get processed.
let's not get into what happens if the amygdala gets hosed. that's more complex than my knowledge base allows me to discuss intelligently.