Another piece of the puzzle?

by Lia
(Saskatchewan)

I am 40 years old and have been struggling with understanding spoken instructions my whole life. I cannot listen to news or ads on the radio; they drive me nuts. I have great difficulty following directions when spoken, and when in class or work I have to write things down to understand them. The buzz of the fridge is making my skin crawl as I write this. I can hardly have a phone conversation since it is so stressful for me to decode what is being said.Even when I meet new people I have to mentally write their names in my head or I will not remember. I cannot tune out background noises and have always found conversations too loud. Recently I had my hearing tested and the results were 100% normal, I had no idea what my problem might be until a co-worker was talking about her autistic son and mentioned SPD and I looked on this site.

I HATE or LOVE certain smells, and I will avoid people or places that smell a certain way. People have always called me oversensitive. I have itchy spots all over my body, I am extremely ticklish, don't like getting hugs, hate sudden loud noises and suffer from what one pharmacist termed 'taste perversion': things just don't taste right to me. I am constantly checking to see if my food is ok, since it will taste like copper or dirt or somehow "off" even though everyone else says it is fine. I can't stand salty food or I go through phases where I want everything extra salty. I love pepper and spices and super sour tastes, like I can eat a grapefruit or even a lemon straight up.

PMS makes it much worse! I get extremely clumsy, drop everything that I touch, knock stuff over, can't judge distances while I am driving, walk into walls and my tolerance for music or other extraneous noise goes to zero.

I have a very hard time getting to sleep and I am one of those unfortunates who abuse the snooze button for as long as possible most mornings. I have a hard time transitioning from one activity to the other and I ABSOLUTELY HATE surprises!!!
I feel 'different' in life and have to work hard some days to calm myself down. The only major disability that I see is that I do have a hard time with oral communication, and that can be a drawback in the workforce. But now I have some idea of where to look to get some help and solutions!

My kids have some symptoms too, especially the constant seeking of tactile sensation and they are both shirt-chewers.

Yay! Some answers that make sense!