There is some spyware/adware that can close anti-spyware programs...but not many. You may want to use hijack this, and post the read out it provides. I can then go over it and hopefully find out what is causing you these problems. Also, try a trojan scanner...it doesn't sound like you have a trojan, but better safe then sorry. There is a link for both hijack this, and some trojan scanners in that long post. I don't know what else to tell you. Without being able to see whats on your computer, I can't just start telling you to remove what you may or may not have. You can always go into the add/remove programs thing, and see if there is anything that you don't recognize; don't remove anything, just tell me what is there that you don't recognize and I can look it up and tell you how to proceed. I must stress that hijack this can be used to find the pest much better then the add/remove programs thing, but it's up to you on how you want to proceed.

I hope this helps, and if you don't know how to save a text file from hijack this, just click save log and name it whatever you want. Then simply copy it and past the text from it in a post here, and I can analyze it for you.

Kayne