Has This Happened To You?

[Brittiny D]

Hello Everyone I recently discovered MD about two weeks ago and have been researching ways to stop DDing all the time. As of last week I was doing so well. I was forcing myself to interact with people, taking herbal supplements, and allowing myself only one hour of DDing time a day. Last Friday I went to sleep and had one of the most violent nightmares that I can remember. The nightmare embodied everything that I am afraid of in this current time of my life coming true. Since then I have fell off the wagon completely. I spent all of today pacing until my feet hurt when I should have been applying to jobs. Once I got myself together tonight I was researching MD again and came across a blog about a woman that experienced similar nightmares when she tried to quit DDing. Has this happened to anyone else that tried to quit?

[Mynx]

Yes the same thing happen to me when I tried "forcing" myself to stop. I ended up having nightmares. I think gradually stopping on your own is better than trying to make yourself not think  about something.

[Brittiny D]

Thank you both for responding. I have been sleeping a little bit better since Friday but my insomnia(which has always been a problem for me) is at an all time high. I really dont want to experience that nightmare again. The name of the blog is:  Freedom: My Struggle with Maladaptive   Daydreaming  maladaptivedaydreamer.wordpress.com. She has an interesting explanantion on how to cure it

[April Dawn Hale]

When I was on medication for Bipolar Disorder and also another medication that was supposed to help stop my Blepharospasm (it's a type of dystonia), I was too groggy most of the time to pull up the energy to daydream like I would have usually. I don't know if I was just getting overwhelmed by stress or other things but I started having sleep paralysis episodes where as I was falling asleep, I would feel as though I was awake, able to see the room around me, but unable to move and there would be terrifying sounds, sensations (There were times where I felt like something was pounding within me and it wasn't my heart), and a general sense that there was something bad coming to get me. I would try to scream and thought I was. Unlike what some people describe sleep paralysis to be, at first they were compound dreams where I would think I had woken up but then I would realize that no, I was still stuck and unable to move. I've since learned to pull myself out of these dreams by focusing on moving particular parts of my body (It's pointless to try and move my hand but if I focus on moving my arms or legs, I will eventually wake up) and to tell myself that they are just dreams and that nothing in them can hurt me.

 

Aparently during those episodes, I was making small noises that were mostly barely audible whining, and my fingers were twitching in real life. I know this because I had a friend sleep over and tell me what was going on. I even held her hand because I thought it might help me wake up if maybe she could squeeze my hand when it started. Until I got to the point where I could get myself out of the dream without any external stimuli, I had to use a noise machine at night to help remind myself that it was just a very messed up dream and that I could wake up if I could just focus on not being terrified.