I must make this very clear to you. Shopping makes me very uncomfortable. I'm not a typical female. Whenever I shop, be it because of a conscious decision that I need a new jacket, or to kill time, or to calm me down when I'm stressed, it just flusters me incredibly. I don't know why I shop to try to calm myself down, it does the opposite. I actually feel physically uncomfortable: I get hot and fidgety. I do not enjoy making decisions - when I go out for a meal my stomach sinks if there are more than 6 dishes on the menu.

And if I start spending money, the floodgates open. I'm not going to add up how much money I spend last time I went clothes shopping because I'm ashamed to find out. I actually blanked a lot of that experience out, I got home and could barely remember what I'd bought. That's how traumatising it is for me. Online shopping is almost as bad, bar one thing:

Helpful shop assistants.

Now, I'm a Saturday girl for a big-brand shop selling CDs and DVDs and games (and various related accessories). And part of my job role involves 'floorwalking', or 'personal shopping'. This involves approaching customers and asking if they need any help. I don't enjoy doing this for a number of reasons: one, nobody ever accepts my help; and two, I know how much I hate it when it happens to me. But I get paid to do it, and it's usually only for an hour at the most, so if I can't find a reason for hiding in the stockroom instead then I'll put up with it.

The reason I bring this up now is because yesterday I had an encounter with a "helpful" shop assistant that was too much for my oddball brain to cope with.

I have the afternoon off college on Wednesdays so yesterday on my way back I decide to stop in the local department store where they have a great trendy make-up counter with brightly coloured eyeliners and things. I'm pleased to spot that the counter is unguarded; the lady on the payroll of my chosen brand is off chatting to her friends over by a distant perfume counter. So I begin browsing, dabbing things on the back of my hand, trying not to get foundation powder on my jacket sleeves.

But less than five minutes later, She appears. Hovering over me in her gaudy red lipstick, she is pretty and intimidating. So I carry on browsing, now feeling faintly embarrassed.

"We have liquid foundation down here too," she says. I do not know what the appropriate response to a comment like this is. Do I carry on looking at the powder, or do I look at what she suggests? Do I ignore her or do I say something?

"Uh... thanks." That's a safe reply, right? I carry on around the display, hoping that was enough for her, but she hangs around, cleaning the lipstick stand or some other task which keeps her less than a yard from me. A minute or so later:

"These matte eyeshadows are actually being discontinued soon, so if you want them you'll have to get them soon."

"Ok." I want to sound more assertive than I feel. I don't look at the matte eyeshadows straight away because I feel that if she gains any control over what I'm looking at, she'll have me hooked and she'll somehow manipulate me into having a full-blown makeover right there in the window of the department store when all I want to do is maybe buy some purple mascara, get the Number 7 bus home and eat my chicken fajita wrap.

As I dip my fingers into the luxury compact eyeshadows, desperately wishing that they provided tissues in this place so the back of my hand could have space left on it, she tries again. "Have you had a look at the powder eyeshadows?"

I'm a rabbit in the headlights. "No?" I don't know why it's a question, I really don't.

"They blend really well together and come in some really nice shades."

By this point I felt so awkward I could have cried. I have never wanted somebody to not do their job as much as I did at that moment. I think I nodded, I can't be sure by this point. I knew I had to make a dash for it, and, stammering a "Thank you", headed for the exit as fast as I could without breaking into a jog.

Now I'm stuck, because I want to buy my nice make-up, and that's the only place that in the area sells it. I'll buy lots of things online, make-up isn't one of those things. What do I do? It's horrific, I'm just a wreck. Maybe I have a phobia of make-up-counter-ladies. This is problematic, as I don't know how to work around it.