Post by Lucy on Feb 24, 2019 13:09:38 GMT
Hi guys. I literally just found out about Maladaptive Daydreaming yesterday and its a little overwhelming. I thought it was completely harmless but I've looked at the symptoms and noticed that I've been daydreaming so much lately. I've also noticed recently that I've been daydreaming in very social and active situations which I never did before. For example, I started daydreaming at one of the loudest concerts ever a few days ago which I don't understand because concerts are meant to make you feel most alive and it was really fun but for some reason I still wanted to escape that reality into my own world. I'm no longer "living in the moment" which scares me because its as if real life will never be as good as the world inside my head.
I started daydreaming when I was little. I created a character inside my head and put that character in scenarios inspired by TV shows I used to watch. I don't think I daydreamed that much when I was little. I had a completely normal and loving childhood. Now however, I really struggle paying attention at school which means that it takes me longer to understand certain things because I keep needing it to be explained to me several times. This makes me feel very insecure about my intelligence because everyone seems to understand and learn things straight away. I'm doing my A levels at the moment and my grades are going okay but its only going to get more difficult. I try to pay attention but I always end up making up excuses like "I'll learn it later" or "I kind of know this so I don't need to pay attention".
In my daydreams I dream about this character who I almost live through. She's this funny, intelligent, beautiful, strong, confident, interesting, quirky and likeable character. She's this person I know I'm not and I enjoy being her more than I enjoy being me. It's like I'm watching a movie only I feel the emotions of the character. I put her in scenarios that I see in films. The characters in my daydreams are based off of real people that I've seen in TV shows or movies however they're faces and bodies are slightly altered. A while ago I tried drawing my character that I essentially live through in my daydreams but I found it difficult to picture every single detail about her face so that I could draw her and I actually made me really because I had this realisation that this person wasn't real.
I mostly daydream when I'm having a bath, watching TV, in the car, during a boring lesson at school, when I wake up in the morning and when I go to bed a night. I stay in bed for hours in the morning just daydreaming. I think its the best time for me to daydream because I know I have so much time and I don't have to worry about anyone seeing me make a silly face. I like to daydream whilst listening to music as it helps me focus more and drowns out anything that might distract me. The song sometimes inspires the daydream and almost becomes the soundtrack to the "movie" I'm watching. For example, if it's this really dramatic song I might daydream about a fight scene or something like that. If I daydream about something that I really like then I'll remember it for later and relive it repeatedly until I get bored of it.
Sometimes I'll mouth the words and almost say the words that my character is saying in my daydreams. Sometimes if my character is running and I'm walking somewhere I'll start suddenly walking faster. I worry when I daydream at school that someone will see me staring into space and creepily smiling and think that I've gone insane. I think it has happened a few time before but I just say that I was remembering a funny video that I watched. I can daydream whilst walking home from the bus and wake up from it in time to look both directions to cross the road.
I don't want my maladaptive daydreaming to be the cause of something far worse. I 100% don't want to stop daydreaming entirely because I formed some kind of emotional attachments to the characters in my day dreams and I love daydreaming so much! But I want to be able to live in the moment more and control when I daydream so that I'm living in reality more.
I started daydreaming when I was little. I created a character inside my head and put that character in scenarios inspired by TV shows I used to watch. I don't think I daydreamed that much when I was little. I had a completely normal and loving childhood. Now however, I really struggle paying attention at school which means that it takes me longer to understand certain things because I keep needing it to be explained to me several times. This makes me feel very insecure about my intelligence because everyone seems to understand and learn things straight away. I'm doing my A levels at the moment and my grades are going okay but its only going to get more difficult. I try to pay attention but I always end up making up excuses like "I'll learn it later" or "I kind of know this so I don't need to pay attention".
In my daydreams I dream about this character who I almost live through. She's this funny, intelligent, beautiful, strong, confident, interesting, quirky and likeable character. She's this person I know I'm not and I enjoy being her more than I enjoy being me. It's like I'm watching a movie only I feel the emotions of the character. I put her in scenarios that I see in films. The characters in my daydreams are based off of real people that I've seen in TV shows or movies however they're faces and bodies are slightly altered. A while ago I tried drawing my character that I essentially live through in my daydreams but I found it difficult to picture every single detail about her face so that I could draw her and I actually made me really because I had this realisation that this person wasn't real.
I mostly daydream when I'm having a bath, watching TV, in the car, during a boring lesson at school, when I wake up in the morning and when I go to bed a night. I stay in bed for hours in the morning just daydreaming. I think its the best time for me to daydream because I know I have so much time and I don't have to worry about anyone seeing me make a silly face. I like to daydream whilst listening to music as it helps me focus more and drowns out anything that might distract me. The song sometimes inspires the daydream and almost becomes the soundtrack to the "movie" I'm watching. For example, if it's this really dramatic song I might daydream about a fight scene or something like that. If I daydream about something that I really like then I'll remember it for later and relive it repeatedly until I get bored of it.
Sometimes I'll mouth the words and almost say the words that my character is saying in my daydreams. Sometimes if my character is running and I'm walking somewhere I'll start suddenly walking faster. I worry when I daydream at school that someone will see me staring into space and creepily smiling and think that I've gone insane. I think it has happened a few time before but I just say that I was remembering a funny video that I watched. I can daydream whilst walking home from the bus and wake up from it in time to look both directions to cross the road.
I don't want my maladaptive daydreaming to be the cause of something far worse. I 100% don't want to stop daydreaming entirely because I formed some kind of emotional attachments to the characters in my day dreams and I love daydreaming so much! But I want to be able to live in the moment more and control when I daydream so that I'm living in reality more.