What a great question! And congratulations for caring for your python for so long. I've had some pretty old snakes too, and I've seen similar issues.
I can't say (with scientific proof) that they lose their sense of smell, but anecdotally agree that it sometimes appears that way...also vision. The difference
is that you can at least SEE their cloudy eyes, but you can't see a change in their Jacobsen's organ. Another factor is that they just don't need as much
food as they get older...their metabolism slows down, their growth slows way down, so they don't have the food drive of a younger snake, and when you
combine that with some reduction of their senses, you have a "finicky" snake that won't always eat the way they used to, or as much.
Snakes teach us patience, that's for sure. I used to have an old Baird's rat snake that apparently had a stroke about 7 years before he passed away.
He was the sweetest snake (& had done public outreach in his younger days) but I had to help him eat after that, and until he passed away at age
27. With him, it wasn't his sense of smell but lack of control of his body. Right now I have an older corn snake (20) that acts similarly to your python
though, and yes, I've seen this in a couple others. Gotta remember that as pets, our snakes live much longer lives than they would in the wild: there,
they'd be preyed upon when they slow down, or they'd get an infection from a failed attempt to constrict prey.
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