Recovering MDer

[RosePrincess]

I have a boyfriend that I am so in love with and sometimes fear going way into MD the way I did when I was younger...where I was obsessed with fictional characters and daydreamed about them all day.  My boyfriend has the qualities I used to daydream about, but it's like I sometimes need to daydream in order to absorb things...it's like I need to imagine conversations (not all the time, though) in order to absorb information.

I was recently reading a really great book series that was told from the first person perspective.  It wasn't a romance novel but had moments of romance in it.  And since those moments were told in first person, I felt more comfortable picturing that the love interest character was my boyfriend (at least for those moments)...and it was nice imagining that it was my bf and that I was the girl in  those scenes.  What I mean is that I pictured that the character looked and sounded like my boyfriend and had his facial expressions, etc.

The strange thing is that the character that has a lot in common with my boyfriend personality-wise.  It feels like their core personalities are very similar.  

And the more the story went on the more he reminded me of him. Their traits are so similar. So it eventually became a habit for me to imagine that he was the character, and not always realizing it.

In one of the books, the situation with the couple reminded me of a weird dream that I had about me and my boyfriend.  I think reading those parts subconsciously reminded me of the dream...and I somehow started having feelings similar to the feelings I had in the dream.

Also, the female character has some traits very similar to mine.  Almost too similar.

But anyway, I think my brain might have somehow gotten confused about it being just a fictional character because the line between the character and my boyfriend started to blur.  I got a bit weirded out so I eventually tried to imagine him not looking like my boyfriend anymore.  But I still had moments that I imagined him looking and sounding like him.  

And I was starting to have OCD worries saying, "Uh oh...I hope I don't have feelings for this fictional character!"  I had feelings when reading the book but I believe it was mostly because of the fact that I was imaging my boyfriend being that character and had a picture of my boyfriend nearby too.

A situation in the book also reminded me about a situation that one of my  (fictional) childhood crushes was in on a show years ago...but it was also like the dream I had of my boyfriend.  So when I read the book, I think it brought up feelings of both things.

Anyway, I had a really short dream where the character in the book said something sweet to me (I was the female character) and I had a sort of warm, happy feeling.  The character didn't have a face but the body structure looked more like in a movie trailer with the character in it.

This doesn't mean I somehow "love" the character or something, does it?  I'm in a very wonderful relationship with my boyfriend and he's the one I'm in love with.  So I'd feel less than faithful if I had feelings for anyone besides him (even fictional character).  I know it's technically not unfaithful...and I can't control my dreams...and I think it's just that he reminds me of him.

I think it's possible my brain just got confused by the similarities between the character and my boyfriend.  I hope that's what it is.  I guess I spent too long projecting my boyfriends image and voice onto that character.  But they were so similar that it was almost hard not to.