Post by totallyfiona on Feb 20, 2021 18:54:48 GMT
Hi there, new on here.
It's a relief finding out that there is a word for this 'thing' that I do. For most of my life, especially as a child, I wouldn't dare tell anyone about my daydreaming habit, knowing it was different from the way other people spoke of daydreams or simply spacing out. It seemed I was the only one that couldn't wait to finish my test so I could sit in silence the rest of the class, sat on the swing set alone and imagined myself playing with other kids instead of actually interacting, couldn't wait to go home to be alone because it meant I could get back to my made up world. The world where I can pretend I am confident and funny and liked. Where I can be with my ideal self lives on only in my mind. I believed there was something very wrong with me. I would literally lose time.
What I wanted was to interact with other kids. Severe social anxiety caused me to freeze at any opportunity. My mind would strike me dumb and blank. Here was my opportunity to say all the funny clever lines I had scripted so carefully in my head. The opportunity to raise my hand with the right answer. But I couldn't manage to do it. I was frozen. So I just pretended. Why would I rather pretend to live my life instead of actually doing it. What is wrong with me, I thought.
Everything that demanded my attention became an annoyance. Every task either became autopilot or was something I had to rush through to get back to my safe place. I couldn't wait to be alone, or at least somewhere that I wouldn't be distracted. I would pretend to be watching TV so nobody would speak to me, but I was really somewhere else much better than anything TV could provide me with. It was the only time I felt good.
Who is this girl in my head that I pretend I am? I would think. And who am I? Am I only what I show to other people? or is the real me who I am infatuated with when I am alone in my head. It would seem that this ideal version of myself is the real one. She feels like me, she is funny and always has something to say. IT is the version of me if I was not imprisoned by fear of other people judging me. It is the version of me without being chained by the anxiety. The automatic reactions that cause me to freeze every time another person looks at me.
I don't remember a time when my mind didn't automatically drift towards that place of freedom. I sit through dinner each night with my boyfriend, mechanically eating, pretending I am somewhere else, someone else, with someone else. A tinge of anger each time he speaks to me, because I have to respond, which pulls me back to where my physical body sits in three dimensional space and time. I respond as little as I can just to keep him off my back, so I can go back. I teeter between both worlds recklessly... burning my hand on a hot pan, missing my turn and getting lost in the car, pretending that I am asleep so I can be left alone to lose myself in this fake world that feels more real than the one my physical body is living in.
I don't want to do this anymore. I feel like all my energy, my potential, my waking brain power is wasted on 'junk thoughts'. I've tried to stop. But I'm gone before I even know it. I know this is going to be hard. I'm 30 years old and I don't want to be like this anymore.
It's a relief finding out that there is a word for this 'thing' that I do. For most of my life, especially as a child, I wouldn't dare tell anyone about my daydreaming habit, knowing it was different from the way other people spoke of daydreams or simply spacing out. It seemed I was the only one that couldn't wait to finish my test so I could sit in silence the rest of the class, sat on the swing set alone and imagined myself playing with other kids instead of actually interacting, couldn't wait to go home to be alone because it meant I could get back to my made up world. The world where I can pretend I am confident and funny and liked. Where I can be with my ideal self lives on only in my mind. I believed there was something very wrong with me. I would literally lose time.
What I wanted was to interact with other kids. Severe social anxiety caused me to freeze at any opportunity. My mind would strike me dumb and blank. Here was my opportunity to say all the funny clever lines I had scripted so carefully in my head. The opportunity to raise my hand with the right answer. But I couldn't manage to do it. I was frozen. So I just pretended. Why would I rather pretend to live my life instead of actually doing it. What is wrong with me, I thought.
Everything that demanded my attention became an annoyance. Every task either became autopilot or was something I had to rush through to get back to my safe place. I couldn't wait to be alone, or at least somewhere that I wouldn't be distracted. I would pretend to be watching TV so nobody would speak to me, but I was really somewhere else much better than anything TV could provide me with. It was the only time I felt good.
Who is this girl in my head that I pretend I am? I would think. And who am I? Am I only what I show to other people? or is the real me who I am infatuated with when I am alone in my head. It would seem that this ideal version of myself is the real one. She feels like me, she is funny and always has something to say. IT is the version of me if I was not imprisoned by fear of other people judging me. It is the version of me without being chained by the anxiety. The automatic reactions that cause me to freeze every time another person looks at me.
I don't remember a time when my mind didn't automatically drift towards that place of freedom. I sit through dinner each night with my boyfriend, mechanically eating, pretending I am somewhere else, someone else, with someone else. A tinge of anger each time he speaks to me, because I have to respond, which pulls me back to where my physical body sits in three dimensional space and time. I respond as little as I can just to keep him off my back, so I can go back. I teeter between both worlds recklessly... burning my hand on a hot pan, missing my turn and getting lost in the car, pretending that I am asleep so I can be left alone to lose myself in this fake world that feels more real than the one my physical body is living in.
I don't want to do this anymore. I feel like all my energy, my potential, my waking brain power is wasted on 'junk thoughts'. I've tried to stop. But I'm gone before I even know it. I know this is going to be hard. I'm 30 years old and I don't want to be like this anymore.
