My name is christina and I am 21. I did not know I had SPD until my mother informed my therapist a few months ago. I always knew I thought differently and I was a little slower then most people. Living with SPD and depression really affects my life. I enjoy reading and traveling. I hope to meet some other people who feel how I feel with having this disability. I took Occupational Therapy in Middle school to help me focus on different tasks and I can say it has helped a lot people often make me feel bad for being the way I am and dub my disability 'not a real disability at all' it really bothers me that this person doesn't understand the hardship I have to endure with SPD

Hi Christina, SPD isn't well understood and because it isn't in the DSM yet few doctors or psychologists have heard of it.

It is a real disability that has a major impact on your life, but you will get little support for it in the main stream medical profession. In fact, if you mention any of your sensory problems be preparred to be labled as crazy. I was shocked when I got the crazy label for the "freaky" sensory problems that suddenly went off the charts (like my light sensitivity).

My light sensitivity can't be meassured by any traditional method, so according to doctors it isn't real. Yet if I try to walk without my Irlen Lenses the chances I will paralyze within 10 minutes is 100%. With Irlen Lenses the chances I will paralyze within 10 minutes drops to 20% and then it is usually caused by the light hitting my eyes through the sides of my glasses.

One of the Neuroptomologist tests I went through caused me a lot of pain and upset (checker board that changed the black and white squares continuously), but the end result was that my eyes and nerves were healthy. To me that simple test causing me pain and upset was a sign of something seriously wrong with me, but to that specialist, because my problem didn't fall into his specialty there was nothing wrong.

So you have to be careful who you tell about your SPD. I usually limit to those I need accommodations from in order to function like a "normal" person.

As far as being "slower" than others, do you have difficulties reading? One problem with light sensitivity is that the words in books seem to move around on you or blur, even though your Optomologist assures you that you have the right glasses prescription for you. This was another problem that the Irlen Lenses fixed for me. It stopped the words from running all over the page and I didn't tire myself out reading as much.

Another thing that can make SPD folk appear "slower" is difficulties in filtering out background noise in conversations. The more important something is, the more I require it in writing. Otherwise, I will "lose" the information.

I can't do multiple tasks and I lost a job because of SPD I got overstressed and ended up hospitalized because of my mental issues.

Could you describe what happened in more detail? Like the pattern of events that led you to getting overstressed?

Did your work know in advance you had a Disability? If so, they can't fire you because of it. The only problem is if you formally state that you have a Disability many companies will try to get away with paying you less, not promoting you, and making your life miserable until you want to quit (since firing someone with a known disability because of the disability is difficult). Technically it is illegal to make a disabled person's life hell in a work place, but until the EEOC gets a lot more staff I doubt this problem will change much.

Mental and Physical Disabilities are both protected under the ADA laws, but you have to disclose the disability.

My work place took what I disclosed about my disabilities and the accommodations I needed and used them against me so that my health went downhill fast. However, it did prevent them from firing me for 2 1/2 years after they first expressed a desire to do so. The job went from great with the necessary accomodations under one boss to hell under another boss that was specifically out to make me quit by removing all accommodations and forcing me to work in areas that I couldn't easily physically access without a lot of help (grudgingly given).