Daydreaming as a Coping Technique Alternatives

I think the first time I used daydream was to counter boredom and social isolation, I was 6 or 7 year old I think.

During my teens year it helped me to endure boredom and lack of positive interactions with people. It make me less "needy".

For now, I would say it somehow protect me from depression and help me to "accept my fate", keep my job and so on. I'm not really satisfied with my carreer and not at all with my personnal life. I'm going to go past 36 yo and it trigger anxiety in me, like an alarm clock. I try to get out of bed and at the same time I hate it.

I use daydreaming to deal with feelings of little worth, feelings of not being able to accomplish, feelings of life dissatisfaction. I use it to escape the real world, where I fear loved ones might commit suicide or might never really find freedom and happiness. I use it to go to the better "future" where I'm making things alright for them, or someone I like is making things alright for me. I use it to have someone love me and enjoy spending time with me romantically when I know I have no plan on how to make the person actually want to go out with me. I use it to see that I'll be a good parent and that my future kids have good lives and good hearts and they don't get messed up like me and my siblings did, and me and my future husband don't get messed up like my parents did. I don't even know alternatives to coping for some of these things. I know for the better life and accomplishments and worth I need to super focus on studies, but for my parenting and relationship fears I don't have a clue on how to cope with that. My two conclusions have been stop about this guy because you'll find the right guy for you in the future and spend time focusing on fixing problems and doing well. But no matter how many times I tell myself that, I can't escape those daydreams because what I really want is to somehow get him to like me and go out with me.

I come from a home that used to be very toxic, there were fights and yells on daily basis since I was very young, it made me close into myself and shut the world outside, so I used MDD my way of dealing with all the hard things I went through by imagining a different life.

As the time passed I kinda decided to stop resisting to it and actually try to deal with it, I channeled it into writing, i'm a writer and I write short stories based on situations that go through my head with other characters that I created.
I also write personal stories, those are more me writing my imagination to organize it in my head and so although I sometimes drift into my DD it's easier to continue writing my stories and have it written down to remember it instead of having my mind looking like spongebob's mind when it was on fire and there were min sponges screaming and running around

well i think for me it started when i was waay younger , it was an escape for me , from my reality and helplessness at the time . because i couldnt physically escape i chose to escape mentally . and when i started to get older it began to effect my daily life and routine , school especially . i still daydream frequently and excessively , i try to stop and quit because im aware that it is dangerous and it stops me from being productive and actually change my life and improve my reality so i wouldnt have the need to daydream anymore . Sadly when i try this , i always get frustrated by whats happening in my life and i would say when my life is so messed up and i cant find joy in anything at least i can day dream and be content for a short period of time . and i just circle back to the same stage or situation .

The strange thing about this is seeing a time in which I was fixated on this guy I knew from college. I still have feelings for him. I wish I could become good friends with him. But I lost faith in the potential between us I once saw. He was a commuter to college, like me. We were both noticeably Hispanic, we both seemed to be hard at work. It seemed neither of us really had a place. And I felt he let me see a side of him he didn't show others. The downside is that he also didn't let me see the side of him he showed others. I caught it in glimpses. Him talking more affirmatively, more certain, him grinning, likely laughing. He was always more subtle with me. It was quieter between us. Gentler. I felt a connection. But as my feelings grew I forgot just why I did not really like him originally. He was not this all kind and compassionate person I imagined he was. He was nice, but not ridiculously nice like I imagined. The subtlety between us I loved and considered as a deeper connection, a silent one, was really just cordiality. He was respectful, and gentle, but not because he felt a connection toward me, because he just had that kind of demeanor when it came to worker with people like me. I was clearly behind and I worked slowly and I was perhaps noticeably on edge. I was extremely nervous. It was hard for us to talk a bit. I think he was nervous too, but probably just because he could tell I was nervous and so he reflected the same attitude. He tried to make me feel accepted I assume, not like I was special, just that I wasn't terrible. And I thought we might have been on the same level intellectually, I thought I might have even been a bit smarter, but I felt that he was always doing most of the work. He definitely did most of the typing. There were times I was a bit behind I think, and he had explained things to me. He was good to me in general, and I think if we can expand that kind of connection between us, to become people who could rely on one another, we could be close friends. We could be confidants in a way.

However, I recognize that we haven't even been that close in a while, and the potential is certainly dwindling. I do not remember the last time he seemed glad to talk with me. I sent him an email during our spring break in March, when covid was finally taking over the news. I pretty much revealed that I think I know where he lives, and because of that and the prominence of covid there I was wondering if he and his loved ones were well. So maybe that is why this semester he showed no happiness in talking to me. Maybe he is just tired of me. He had responded in the break saying I was so thoughtful for remembering him (it was over a year after we had worked together as math lab partners), but when I saw him this semester he didn't seem glad to see me. I felt for certain that I was really just an interruption this time. And the one time in the Spring I had talked to him in person, he also seemed like he had wished I hadn't approached him. Like he didn't care. Much different than the fall that year, in which he said hi and tried to talk to me. I would like to get close to him still. I would like to work with him again. I would like to be his confident even. His long term work partner. But I lost faith in that that could ever happen at this point, and I am letting the chance slip away.

I know me from a year ago would hate me for not caring. She would hate me for allowing myself to fall in love with someone I met online, or someone else at all. At that time, I felt that he was the only one who could save me from the mess I wanted to dive to romantically chase my sixth grade crush. I thought he was the only one who could make me fall in love again. I still wanted to help my sixth grade crush for his sake, but I felt that I might just be passed wanting to romantically pursue him. I thought that I would be able to confide in this guy everything. I thought that I would be able to fully explain to him how my feelings work and how I was ashamed of them and he would help me get through them. Honestly, between him, my sixth grade crush, and the guy online, he is clearly the safe choice. That happy parenting and happy family stuff I find extremely hard to imagine with the guy I currently have feelings for. My sixth grade crush I never reconnected with, but he never did seem quite as gentle as my college crush. I feel that he is the obvious choice if I were looking for someone who might actually be able to handle the pressure of my mental problems. But I am almost certain that the version of him that is completely in love with me and strong and kind will never be able to exist. I know he is very hard working. I know he was struggling to keep up in classes too (which I found out through someone else after we were done working together), which was another reason I connected to him. But I think that he too is susceptible to excessive stress. I wanted to help him too. It was with him that I was finally able to imagine just being accepted for love as the way I am (sorry, side tangent). I wanted to help him with any of the strict family stuff he might have been facing too, or any difficulty in keeping up he might have been having. I wanted to and still want to ask him if he ever feels that everyone around knows each other better than you know anybody around. I wanted to connect with him on being excluded from campus life and connection. And I still do. When I see him walking by I still like him. I still am into him. I still want to steal some extra time of his and I would like to see him happy to talk to me. But the idea of starting up an intimate relationship with him seems extremely difficult at this point, and that is if somehow we did become very close. The thing is, I found a different confidant. I found someone else I told everything. I found someone else that I still care about and deep down I honestly feel that even if it isn't what would help most, even if it isn't what I want most, it is where I really should be. And I know he has to make choices too. I know he might choose someone else, but if he were over them, and wanted me back, I will come back to wanting him too. I can't put another guy a care about in the position of being place filler. I need to learn to be happy alone so that I could be with him in those few times he loves me back as more than a friend, or I need to learn to get over him fully. I do not know how to yet, so starting a relationship with that guy from college (or even becoming confidants) shouldn't happen and seems very difficult.

I have a little spot in my heart that mourns for the love I held for this guy, and one that mourns for the one I held for my sixth grade crush. These two shaped my life in a way I do not think anything could replace. Even with a new love interest, one that I feel truly dominates my life in a way that I can't get out of and won't ever be able to return from, I still hold those connections dear. I still value the time I loved him and I value the time I loved my sixth grade crush. And I long for those possibilities back. Perhaps they will be actual possibilities someday, but right now I think my heart is fixed. But I do really wish we could be close still. I do not want our friendship to continue to fade. I want it to grow. But my faith in that actually happening is slim. I do not see him enough or at optimal times to help grow our connection, and I think emailing him just makes it worse. If I ever go back to obsessing over him, I will be so angry at myself for letting my opportunity to get close to him slip away.