As a temporary workaround, you could try using some non-standard 'space' characters, such as the "punctuation space". You can find them in the windows character map utility, or you may be able to copy/paste them from my text below (the first character of each line):
punctuation space (this one may work as it often gets treated more like a 'real character' by various programs, rather than as a space)
en quad space
em quad space
6-per-em space