|
|
Post by quinn on Dec 23, 2019 20:01:58 GMT
 Ive known about Maladaptive dreaming for quite sometime but never had a community to talk to about it. Since it’s hardly researched I’ve been looking for some advice from others going through the same thing. This is my first time joining a forum so I’m not exactly sure how it works. I’m  to be apart of the discussions and look forward to finding my way around forums. (Also I’m not the best at breaking up my paragraphs, hopefully this flows well) Daydreaming has always been an obstacle of mine. Although I’ve always denied that I daydream too much. I struggle to understand when daydreaming becomes maladaptive. How much daydreaming does it take? If I’m trying to stop maladaptive daydreaming, how do I know how much daydreaming is ok? Also how do I know the difference? Is there different levels of daydreaming? Would I ever be able to simply daydream, not md? Some of these questions might be confusing. I am  if I am 100% maladaptive or if I’m just daydreaming. I think I’m in denial but it’s so difficult to tell. I’ve looked up lots of resources but I seem to have hit a road block. If anyone could shed some light on what the difference between daydreaming and Maladaptive daydreaming is, that would be great. |
|
|
|
Post by alvi on Dec 23, 2019 22:44:44 GMT
Welcome to the forum Quinn!
Regular daydreaming is something nearly everyone does and gives the person enjoyment it is easy to stop and start and has no negative aspects on the daydreamer, whereas MD is a condition that causes intense daydreaming that distracts a person from their real life, replaces human interaction and may interfere with normal functioning such as social life or work. It has a negative impact on the sufferers day to day life and can at times become distressing when the MDer finds that they are not able to control their fantasy and that is causing them problems in the real world.
|
|
|
|
Post by Sam on Dec 24, 2019 4:20:41 GMT
I agree with what alvi said. What constitutes as maladaptive varies from person to person, but like Alvi said, if it prevents you from getting thins done in your real life and you find yourself having a hard time pulling yourself out of daydreams so that you can do things, its likely maladaptive. |
|
|
|
Post by quinn on Dec 24, 2019 19:44:52 GMT
Welcome to the forum Quinn! Regular daydreaming is something nearly everyone does and gives the person enjoyment it is easy to stop and start and has no negative aspects on the daydreamer, whereas MD is a condition that causes intense daydreaming that distracts a person from their real life, replaces human interaction and may interfere with normal functioning such as social life or work. It has a negative impact on the sufferers day to day life and can at times become distressing when the MDer finds that they are not able to control their fantasy and that is causing them problems in the real world. Thanks so much for the response! I often find myself drifting into daydreams without knowing. It can take me a while to realize and actually stop it. Is this considered MD? It does distract me from my daily life and I will have issues getting work done because of my daydreams. Also I have noticed a lot of things I use to do I stopped doing and I unintentionally replaced that free time with daydreaming. It does cause me distress but it’s hard for me to stop. In the moment of my daydreams it is enjoyable. For MD in the moment are daydreams not suppose to be enjoyable? Would this mean I am not a MDer? Also I’ve read that Mders commonly have one really vivid world. In my case i have a few. Sorry if this is confusing. I have this portal like realm so my characters I’ve created can jump between different settings and life styles. For example if I daydream about a more realistic lifestyle I have a normal-like world. If I want a more fantasy world I have a few portals for that. Also I will commonly have a few worlds that are largely based off books but I’ll throw in my own twists. So I keep my characters and then in each realm I’ll make some more that don’t always move from place to place. It’s kinda goes based on my mood. Is that still mding? That’s my own experience I don’t mean to weird people out, I’m very secretive abt what’s going on with me and dont have anywhere else to turn to. So I apologize for the abundance of questions. |
|
|
|
Post by quinn on Dec 24, 2019 19:48:43 GMT
I agree with what alvi said. What constitutes as maladaptive varies from person to person, but like Alvi said, if it prevents you from getting thins done in your real life and you find yourself having a hard time pulling yourself out of daydreams so that you can do things, its likely maladaptive. I appreciate your response! Would this mean that if my daydreams are maladaptive that all my daydreams are? To clarify further, i daydream a lot and they do negatively impact my life, but would ALL my daydreams that I have be building md or is it possible to have non maladaptive, daydreams? Is there ever a distinction between normal daydreams and maladaptive daydreams in the same person? I hope that makes sense, if not I can attempt to clarify more. |
|
|
|
Post by Sam on Dec 25, 2019 5:02:26 GMT
I agree with what alvi said. What constitutes as maladaptive varies from person to person, but like Alvi said, if it prevents you from getting thins done in your real life and you find yourself having a hard time pulling yourself out of daydreams so that you can do things, its likely maladaptive. I appreciate your response! Would this mean that if my daydreams are maladaptive that all my daydreams are? To clarify further, i daydream a lot and they do negatively impact my life, but would ALL my daydreams that I have be building md or is it possible to have non maladaptive, daydreams? Is there ever a distinction between normal daydreams and maladaptive daydreams in the same person? I hope that makes sense, if not I can attempt to clarify more. This is a good question. Again, I feel that it differs from person to person. I, personally, can differentiate between "normal" daydreams and "maladaptive" daydreams, though some people can't. For myself, normal daydreams are the short daydreams that I get that revolve around my real life in some way, but that don't have any character building and I don't have any attachment to them--basically, daydreams that aren't immersive (this is the kind of daydreaming that pretty much all non-MDers do). My ability to differentiate seems to depend on how frequently I'm being triggered. Right now, I'm going through a lot of stress (a trigger) and I've been reading a lot of books and watching a lot of movies (also both triggers), so I've noticed that the non-immersive daydreaming has taken a break and I have a near constant stream of maladaptive daydream content, which is something that I haven't dealt with for a while. I actually created a poll a while ago about whether you can differentiate between normal and maladaptive daydreams. |
|
|
|
Post by someone on Dec 26, 2019 15:02:16 GMT
I appreciate your response! Would this mean that if my daydreams are maladaptive that all my daydreams are? To clarify further, i daydream a lot and they do negatively impact my life, but would ALL my daydreams that I have be building md or is it possible to have non maladaptive, daydreams? Is there ever a distinction between normal daydreams and maladaptive daydreams in the same person? I hope that makes sense, if not I can attempt to clarify more. This is a good question. Again, I feel that it differs from person to person. I, personally, can differentiate between "normal" daydreams and "maladaptive" daydreams, though some people can't. For myself, normal daydreams are the short daydreams that I get that revolve around my real life in some way, but that don't have any character building and I don't have any attachment to them--basically, daydreams that aren't immersive (this is the kind of daydreaming that pretty much all non-MDers do). My ability to differentiate seems to depend on how frequently I'm being triggered. Right now, I'm going through a lot of stress (a trigger) and I've been reading a lot of books and watching a lot of movies (also both triggers), so I've noticed that the non-immersive daydreaming has taken a break and I have a near constant stream of maladaptive daydream content, which is something that I haven't dealt with for a while. I actually created a poll a while ago about whether you can differentiate between normal and maladaptive daydreams.  . I had not seen it this way. I had thought MD was about amount and frequency. I thought it was normal for everyone to have immersive daydreams, and that just how often and how hard it is to leave made a difference. So, I wouldn't consider someone an MDer if they daydream out of control for one day, or even one really tough week. When people face a big problem, it's not unusual for them to fall into excessive daydreaming. But most people couldn't stay that way. In a week or so they go to something else, like attempting to fix the problem again or changing to some kind of worse coping mechanism. Daydreaming just can't fill the void too long for most people. So if I daydream excessively for one day in a whole year, or daydream a long daydream that is hard to leave once in 3.5 weeks or something, I wouldn't have a problem. It wouldn't significantly affect my life. But if I'm having a daydream and it's the third daydream a week if it's long or the 5th daydream a day if it's short and easy to leave and it's been going on this way for a while, I know it's a problem. For me, even the little ones add up. I can't trust them because I know they don't fill the void and I'll keep going back to them excessively, and it will still affect my life. It's like sleep I guess, sleeping for a full night makes you last till the next night, but sleeping in little intervals can take as much or more time, and it will never give you as much satisfaction as a full night's sleep because your brain can never go to the deeper stages. This is just my experience. So I have considered those daydreams MD daydreams also when they happen way too often. I'm not too familiar with the research, but I've felt that MD daydreams are those that hold you back (like the 3rd long immersive daydream a week or the fifth shorter, less immersive daydream in like 8 hours, excluding sleeping hours, after it's been carrying on like that for a while). I really like your question Quinn, it really got me wondering. |
|
Ive known about Maladaptive dreaming for quite sometime but never had a community to talk to about it. Since it’s hardly researched I’ve been looking for some advice from others going through the same thing.
to be apart of the discussions and look forward to finding my way around forums. (Also I’m not the best at breaking up my paragraphs, hopefully this flows well) 
if I am 100% maladaptive or if I’m just daydreaming. I think I’m in denial but it’s so difficult to tell. I’ve looked up lots of resources but I seem to have hit a road block. If anyone could shed some light on what the difference between daydreaming and Maladaptive daydreaming is, that would be great.
. I had not seen it this way. I had thought MD was about amount and frequency. I thought it was normal for everyone to have immersive daydreams, and that just how often and how hard it is to leave made a difference. So, I wouldn't consider someone an MDer if they daydream out of control for one day, or even one really tough week. When people face a big problem, it's not unusual for them to fall into excessive daydreaming. But most people couldn't stay that way. In a week or so they go to something else, like attempting to fix the problem again or changing to some kind of worse coping mechanism. Daydreaming just can't fill the void too long for most people. So if I daydream excessively for one day in a whole year, or daydream a long daydream that is hard to leave once in 3.5 weeks or something, I wouldn't have a problem. It wouldn't significantly affect my life. But if I'm having a daydream and it's the third daydream a week if it's long or the 5th daydream a day if it's short and easy to leave and it's been going on this way for a while, I know it's a problem. For me, even the little ones add up. I can't trust them because I know they don't fill the void and I'll keep going back to them excessively, and it will still affect my life. It's like sleep I guess, sleeping for a full night makes you last till the next night, but sleeping in little intervals can take as much or more time, and it will never give you as much satisfaction as a full night's sleep because your brain can never go to the deeper stages. This is just my experience. So I have considered those daydreams MD daydreams also when they happen way too often. I'm not too familiar with the research, but I've felt that MD daydreams are those that hold you back (like the 3rd long immersive daydream a week or the fifth shorter, less immersive daydream in like 8 hours, excluding sleeping hours, after it's been carrying on like that for a while). I really like your question Quinn, it really got me wondering.