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Old Jul 21, 2019, 10:13 AM
Anonymous46341
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Quote:
Originally Posted by yellow_fleurs View Post
BirdDancer can I ask how you got past the maladaptive daydreaming? I do daydream a lot, it's not always to get out of a stressful situation or anything, just the way my brain has always worked since I was a kid. My dad used to tell me to stop daydreaming when I was a kid. I also don't know when it becomes daydreaming, I am sometimes just thinking up a plot for a story, analyzing a situation, running through a song in my head. Things get busy, but it's hard for me to imagine it being quieter than that, I sort of assumed everyone's head was this busy until I realized when my therapist would ask me what I had just thought of that it might be a bunch of things nearly at the same time haha. Although, sometimes I cannot think of a single thought if I am feeling tired or depressed.
Hi yellow_fleurs! The short answers are bulleted:

* Recognizing that the daydreaming was a problem/maladaptive
* A conscious decision to stop. Cutting down on it (sort of like sweets or other similar addictive things)
* Grounding techniques
* Success in finding a passion or other major activity that I really wanted to focus on
* Time for my brain to heal
* Good therapists that helped me get past it

My maladaptive daydreaming was not something that I stopped abruptly. It decreased over time. Perhaps with the above help it started to become less satisfying. The pleasure (or whatever positive) I derived from it decreased. Reality showed itself more. The stories ran their course.

At its worst, I was daydreaming for literally 12 hours in a day. I daydreamed when my husband was home, when visiting others, when driving, when shopping...all of the time. Mostly, I spend several hours per day in bed binge daydreaming. I neglected a lot. I often "didn't hear" people talking to me, for the most part. It became an obsessive/compulsive type activity, but I don't have OCD. I would often rework similar daydreams multiple times with slightly different versions.

I think my past maladaptive daydreaming was a means of coping. An unhealthy way of protecting myself from the trauma I had experienced in the past. That is similar with dissociation. I guess I can understand why I sometimes experienced dissociative symptoms during that period. When that period ended, so did my symptoms of dissociation.

Last edited by Anonymous46341; Jul 21, 2019 at 10:38 AM.
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