How do you resist MD?

hey, hey. to be honest i find myself now at a point where i am not resisting anymore. but i have been trying in the past to do so and it helped out a little. i have posted this to a lot of people asking how to stop it, and the first thing i find myself saying is "its an addiction, you are addicted to daydreaming. and its important to know you are." and i still stick with that. you/your mind enjoys daydreaming and when you do so you probably make dopamine. the drug of happiness. its just like smoking or drinking but instead of being addicted to something you dont have unlimited and need t get everytime you are addicted to something so easy to get, because its you who makes it. what many dont see is that daydreaming has a price too, time. and time is one very important thing. but okey i see you understand that. so lets talk about how to resist it a little bit. first i need you to understand everyone is different so what works for me might not work for you. my way of reducing it is by finding a new, and less time consuming way of getting dopamine, for me that was sporting, cooking or drawing. i think this helped me because it made the reality fun to be in too. this made me not wanting to drift away from reality to much. then i started interupting my daydreams, even thtoo that upset/ irritated me i knew i must do so for the greater good. and last but not least i made my daydreams cruel/boring by killing characters off and ending the plot. but i have now decided to come in peace with it and dont fight it anymore allthough it consumes a lot of my time i have learned to multitask a bit.

Gosh, I completely understand the struggle. I deal with the same thing here, aha. How utterly exhausting it is to waste hours daydreaming rather than actually finishing the work you need to get done... .

I think that learning how to cope with your MD more effectively depends on your particular case of daydreaming. For example, a person who uses MD as a way to cope with loneliness might find their symptoms eased by opening up to close friends/family, while someone who uses MD as a way to cope with feelings of chronic emptiness might need to deal with those underlying feelings before fully being able to deal with their MD. I personally think that it's important to recognize why exactly you maladaptive daydream, so that you're able to deal with the underlying causes/issues.

Among other tips not already mentioned...
- Recognize and avoid your triggers; your triggers would be anything in particular that makes you want to daydream. And recognizing your triggers is also helpful if you don't know why you daydream, because it might help you understand what could be causing the urges (ex. wanting to MD whenever things get stressful).

- Count how many times you daydream each day; at the start, it's going to be practically impossible to cut out daydreaming entirely. So, just start off small: count how many times you daydream in a day, and work on cutting down that number, slowly but surely. With time, things will hopefully get better and improve. 

Wishing you well, Allison!

Hi all. I'm going 'cold turkey'. I've a diary in another thread called 'Day One'. At the moment (I'm on day three) there is an almost constant urge to MDD. I'm focusing on saying no to myself, realising it's not healthy and how well I'm doing. I guess the thing about focusing on the endgame is really working for me. It's not easy, and certainly there has been no immediate change. In fact, I feel pretty anxious. But, I realise that I'm trying to combat a lifelong addiction, and taking strength from the hope that one day I'll be free of MDD. GOOD LUCK TO ALL OF YOU. S

Thanks for your kind words. I'm not likely to fall into other types of addiction. In fact, my other addiction is running. , always found that a tad paradoxical. One addiction internal, one external. I just need to stop MDD. It's controlled me for such a long time. I've a good friend watching over me, and keeping my diary on the other thread is keeping me honest. I decided to be totally open on there, and I'm guessing folk will be honest with me if I'm slipping. Thanks for your kindness, again.

So atm, I’m staying at my bfs house. I’m visiting bc long distance relationship stuff, and I’ve found that being around him actually makes me go from wanting to daydream to preferring to spend time with him. That’s only sometimes, but I’ve been daydreaming much less while I’m here than I usually do. I thought this was interesting, so I thought I’d share!