A READER ASKS ABOUT UNEXPLAINED ITCHING AND FELT TOUCHES

By Mark A. Shryock

This response is for entertainment and informational purposes only. The response is not medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. I am not a licensed medical professional, and nothing herein should be construed as such.

My mystical abilities allow me at times to work directly with people, but I am not a distance medical reader or healer. I do not diagnose, treat, or offer medical guidance remotely or otherwise.

If you are experiencing unexplained physical symptoms, please consult a qualified healthcare provider. If you feel the sensations are distressing, painful, or accompanied by other symptoms, seek medical attention promptly.

Hi Liz. Thank you for trusting me with this. The body can speak a language the doctors do not have a dictionary for, and I know how disorienting the experience can be. Your question lands in a liminal space where the physical and the energetic overlap, and I want to honor both.

My feeling is the situation you describe is kundalini rising. But I have to weigh whether something is medical or spiritual, and often the two manifest as both. For me, during kundalini rising in the late 1980s until I integrated the vast energy, the itching and touching would flare when I skipped walking. The symptoms returned when I avoided nature. Pushing the spiritual too hard triggered the same imbalance. In short, I was becoming ungrounded and developing symptoms as you describe from being out of balance and not taking care of myself, not giving to myself, but giving to everyone else. The body will whisper first, then speak, then shout. The itching and the felt touches may be your system asking you to come back into balance before the kundalini force intensifies.

I would encourage you to research kundalini rising symptoms and see if the broader picture resonates with your experience.

The College of Psychic Studies describes clairsentience as involving sensations such as tingling, warmth, or pressure in different parts of the body in response to specific energies. One reader on LizRoberta.com specifically described feeling Spirit’s hands on my shoulders, across my back, and on my face and hands, which was identified as clairsentience. The Patheos blog on spirit guide communication describes clairsentience as involving a physical sensation of prickles on the arms, tingles down the spine, butterflies in the stomach, and so on.

The itching that precedes the felt touches can be the nervous system recalibrating to run a higher frequency of sensory information. The sequence you describe, itching first, then tactile contact, fits the pattern of energy moving through the dermis before becoming distinct enough to localize.

A 2022 peer-reviewed study published in Frontiers in Psychology formally investigated kundalini-related experiences in meditators and found that sensory phenomena included somatosensory experiences such as tingling, tickling, itching, and vibrating sensations. The study noted these sensations often move through the body and correlate with energy shifts.

Sai Ayurvedic lists itching, vibrating, prickling, tingling, stinging or crawling sensations among common manifestations of risen kundalini energy. The website When Kundalini Awakens includes rashes and itching or needles all over in its list of physical symptoms.

SpiritualMarker.com maps itching to specific body areas and their energetic significance. Itchy hands indicate activation of energetic pathways and readiness for manifestation. Itchy arms suggest a desire to take action. The back, shoulders, and arms represent support, strength, and stability and may signal unseen forces or ancestors are watching over you.

From a chakra framework, itching will often live in the root or sacral chakra but varies by location. During kundalini awakening, skin issues are present when one’s kundalini is open. Skin issues are a sign of your body releasing something.

Shoulders and hands are traditionally supported and guided areas. If the touches feel benevolent, even if startling, you might simply be being reassured or steadied by something that has been trying to connect for a while. The itching could have been the first phase of the contact. Energy was moving through before the contact became distinct enough to localize.

If you have been reading expanded or esoteric material, your consciousness may be stretching the skin of old identity. The felt touches may be your own higher awareness literally touching into the physical. Your multidimensional self may be making handshake contact with the 3D version.

A Canadian energy medicine practitioner describes how her body acts as a human barometer or tuning fork during client work. She states she will literally get sensations in her own body mirroring where the energy might be stuck or blocked. She might feel a tingle in one of her toes or fingers. She becomes extremely hot, with sweat pouring down her back. She notes these sensations subside when the spiritual blockage is cleared.

Asking directly works. Before sleep or in quiet, simply ask who is touching me or what are you showing me, and watch for images, words, or feelings in the next 48 hours.

Grounding the spiritual force helps. Placing your feet in water or soil can help the body integrate the frequency without the itchy static.

Setting boundaries is essential. If anything feels off, you have absolute sovereignty to say only benevolent contact please, and mean it. Consent matters in every dimension.

There are also medical explanations to consider.

Liver disease and cholestasis create impaired bile secretion, which leads to generalized pruritus, often worse on palms and soles. Primary biliary cirrhosis, viral hepatitis, and obstructive jaundice are associated conditions.

Chronic kidney disease and uremia generate pruritus in more than 50% of patients with chronic renal disease and up to 80% of patients on dialysis. The itching is often generalized.

Thyroid disorders, both hypothyroidism and hyperthyroidism, are recognized endocrine sources of chronic pruritus.

Diabetes mellitus is listed among endocrine sources. Diabetic neuropathy can also contribute to abnormal skin sensations.

Iron deficiency and polycythemia vera are hematological diseases recognized as sources of chronic pruritus without skin lesions.

Hodgkin lymphoma is the malignant disease most strongly associated with pruritus. Hodgkin lymphoma affects up to 30% of patients and can precede diagnosis by years.

Drug related pruritus results from numerous medications. Chloroquine and hydroxyethyl starch are among the drugs that generate generalized itching without rash.

Peripheral neuropathy and small fiber neuropathy stem from diabetes, vitamin B12 deficiency, and other nerve disorders. These conditions create abnormal sensations interpreted as crawling, tingling, or light touches.

Neurological conditions such as multiple sclerosis, stroke, meningitis, and encephalitis produce formication.

Menopause and hormonal shifts generate formication as a recognized symptom. Formication is a known symptom of menopause and hormone withdrawal.

Medication side effects from ciprofloxacin, steroids, ketoconazole, amantadine, topiramate, SSRIs, SNRIs, tramadol, and opioids lead to formication.

Substance use and withdrawal from alcohol, cocaine, methamphetamine, and benzodiazepines generate formication.

Psychiatric causes such as anxiety, depression, OCD, and somatic symptom disorders manifest as psychogenic pruritus or tactile sensations.

The recommended initial medical workup for generalized pruritus without skin lesions includes a complete blood count, liver function tests with alkaline phosphatase and bilirubin, renal function tests with creatinine and BUN, thyroid-stimulating hormone, fasting glucose, and iron studies.

If the sensations are localized to specific dermatomes on the arms, shoulders, and hands as you described, a neurological workup may be warranted to assess for neuropathic or compressive causes.

If the sensation was brief and passed, the experience may have been nothing more than a neurological blip or an emotional wave. But if the sensation recurs, comes with confusion, visual changes, a metallic taste, deja vu, or any physical symptoms, the experience is worth mentioning to a doctor. A neurologist is the ideal specialist if the sensation keeps happening.

If all labs are clean and the sensations feel benevolent or patterned, with the same locations and same quality, the medical and energetic explanations are not mutually exclusive. Ruling out the physical first is always wise.

Liz, if your experience is kundalini rising, the kindest thing you can do is slow down, walk, get your feet in the dirt, and give back to yourself before you keep giving outward. The kundalini force will not be pushed. The rising force will only integrate when you meet the force with grounded presence.

Copyright © Mark A. Shryock. May be shared with attribution.

Art by Mark A. Shryock

SOURCES

Maxwell, R.W., Katyal, S. Characteristics of Kundalini-Related Sensory, Motor, and Affective Experiences During Tantric Yoga Meditation. Frontiers in Psychology, Volume 13, Article 863091, 2022.

College of Psychic Studies. Clairsentience and psychic sensation descriptions.

LizRoberta.com. Reader account of felt touch experience identified as clairsentience.

Patheos. Blog post on spirit guide communication and physical sensation markers.

Sai Ayurvedic. Common physical manifestations of kundalini energy.

When Kundalini Awakens. List of physical symptoms of kundalini awakening.

SpiritualMarker.com. Body area itching and energetic significance mapping.

Karger Publishers, Kidney and Blood Pressure Research. Chronic Kidney Disease-Associated Pruritus: A Review.

Dialysis Outcomes and Practice Patterns Study (DOPPS) data on chronic kidney disease-associated pruritus prevalence.

Annals of Oncology. Rare syndromes in Hodgkin’s disease, pruritus prevalence and prognostic significance.

ScienceDirect. When itching signals more: A case of chronic pruritus leading to cancer diagnosis.

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