Discussion Anyone else have MADD?

[yellowsouled]

MADD = Maladaptive daydreaming. Like, 24/7 daydreaming to the point where it affects your life, and you may (to a mild extent!) act out parts of the daydreams (pacing, gesturing to yourself, etc).

(Yes, I'm posting a lot today, but since my CTB plans are in motion, I figure I'm allowed to ramble.)

I genuinely think MADD is part of the reason I didn't kill myself years ago. It's a bad coping mechanism, duh, but it's also recently made me actually take action to CTB.

It works to stop you for awhile because oh, wow, fun daydreams. Way more fun and comforting than normal life. People actually like me in them! You can do literal anything!

But unlike ambitious/possible but out there daydreams, I'm a whole different person, age, etc in my daydreams. It's not a thing like "I daydream I get a career advancement" or even more fantastical stuff like "I daydream I will somehow pilot a plane if the pilots fall unconscious" but I'm the same person with the same "story" or something. They're literally impossible daydreams that will NEVER happen, (at least not in this life, if you believe in multiple realities/reincarnation).

And I'm just now seriously thinking through lately and realizing I've wasted 90% of my life from age ~8ish to now daydreaming these things that will never happen. Continuing to live will not make them happen.

I remember being in 2nd grade or so and agitating my parents when they ask why I didn't do my school work because I was busy daydreaming the whole period. It's possible I did it even younger than that, and I just turned 23 this month. So at least 15ish years or more of spending time daydreaming about things that will never come to pass instead of doing Literally anything else.

It's not that it makes no sense. Shitty home situation + chronic pain = very easy to get lost in your own head where you're a different person in a different life and not experiencing these things (or, if you do, people are sympathetic, there's "cures", and a support network). But, like, Jesus. It's just really hit me in the last few months like...these things can never happen. They will never happen. I always kind of knew that, obviously, but knowing something and seriously contemplating it are two different things.

If there is a "higher power" and it is aware and merciful, it'd be cool to be reborn/shifted/sorted/whatever the hell into one of my daydream worlds. A lot of them aren't perfect lives/scenarios, but there's always a support network, people who actually care, minimal stress, etc. But if it's just Nothing, like when you're asleep and not dreaming, well, then, at least I won't be permanently stuck with chronic pain. I've been sleeping a ton more lately anyways due to both increasing depression and increasing pain (they feed off of each other, who woulda thunk) so it'd basically just be standard operating procedure anyways.

 

[quietwoods]

If you are set on CTB, I don't consider maladaptive daydreaming to be bad at all. It's normal and even healthy to disconnect from an existence you want to quite literally end.

If you're still looking to live, yeah it's not a productive use of time.

 

[Nothing Left]

Yep.

Had it since childhood wasted and 90% of my life on it, as well.

I would dissociate at home and talk to imaginary people, and it escalated to physically acting out daydreams as if I was a theatre actor on stage (when I was alone at home).

If I'm doing a low-level, repetitive, menial tasks at a job, I completely dissociate through all of it just to make it through the shift.

Even when I was in the Army, I would do it. I got publicly humiliated by a civilian contractor for dissociating during one of his lectures, and wasn't able to properly execute combat drills without being yelled at because I wasn't paying attention to the instructions. They thought I was mentally retarded.

It's difficult to stay lucid most of the time and when I'm intentionally trying to focus on something important or learn new information, my mind begins slipping away. Even when I'm watching movies or shows I actually enjoy, I'm dissociating - it's like escapism within escapism.

 

[Sergeant45]

I wasted so much of my life doing that, and the things I missed because of it only egged on escapism, daydreaming, and dissociation more and more. I did terrible in school. I could never hold a job that requires you to actually be mentally present. When I've worked despite my bodily illness, it were things that were repetitive and burn themselves into your muscle memory over time.

As much as I'd like to say "it WAS a cycle" in past tense, I still do that.... More than ever before. It is a cycle that only gets worse for me. But it's better than anything else this life could give me.

I don't know if I specifically also have MADD, but I do have a dissociative disorder. I hope not. Chronic mental absence really neglects the real life, obviously (and sadly)....

I hope you find peace.

 

[Wolf Girl]

Same here. Additionally, I latch onto one person in my life and make a daydream version of them that I talk to all day. It's okay if the real person is still somewhat present in your life, but recently the guy I was in love with and internalized ghosted after 6 months. I'm in the same place you are with realizing my daydreams are impossible because he'll never come back. I think it's time to start moving on ctb. I'm just tired of losing people.