What to do if everything I use for tactile defensiveness doesn't help.

by Patrick Meehan
(Ohio)

I am very sensitive to light touch in the form of tickling. As a matter of fact, all light touch is nothing but a torturous tickle that I find very annoying. I feels very painful to be tickled by others, it feels like a severe experience of ants crawling on my body and just drives me absolutely nuts.

I use to be a cashier at a grocery store and from what I could tell you for a person who suffers from SPD, I could tell you some of the most profound reactions I had with customers. If a customer grabbed something from my hand depending on the customer and how they carried themselves I would very easily withdraw and have to pull my hand away from the customer. I was also able to tell from looking at a customer the most likely chance that they would do the most profound tickling around me.

It was so bad to the point that if I went to work I had to wear a special type of gloves to protect my hands from being tickled. I would also experience having my chest or stomach tickled by customer by how they had their hands positioned, which to me was extremely overwhelming for me to have to deal with.

If any of you ever had a similar experience to what I had, please let me know and also let me know how you learned how to deal with the problem.

I can always use suggestions from anybody. Thanks!