This is my post, there are better and prettier posts than it, but I like this one because it is mine.

[Penguin]

Alright. 19 year old guy, full-blown dreamer since I was about 13, earliest I can trace the habit back to is 5. Maybe I've been like this all my life, wouldn't know as my memory is worthless (seems I'm not alone in that).

I suppose it wouldn't hurt to keep a blog of my progress and thoughts. I have already started taking notes so making this for all of you see might turn out beneficial for others as well. Though, knowing my history of consistency, I don't know if I am able to keep up with it. So yeah.

Here goes.

My fantasies are all very narcissistic, plots are fairly simple and I almost never have actual characters that aren't there to prop up my ego. I did have more detail to them but over the years they have reduced to easily attainable chunks of feel-good. Main theme is being admired for attributes like intelligence, creativity, beauty, also reliving my life to change what I was (awkward) into what I dream I could have been (awesome). Fairly common amongst y'all, it seems, the main difference being that they are all very shallow and ego-centered (though I've seen a few of you sharing the pattern).

Daydreaming consumes, or consumed (making some progress), all of my time. Even the quickest are at least a couple of minutes long with a lot of them 30-90 minutes or so, and I've had a couple of months worth of time wasted on ones that last nearly all day.

The categorization I've used for a couple of days now, for tracking purposes, is:

1. Full-blown. The kind with a story and setting, biggest emotional satisfaction and the ones that make me feel the worst afterwards if I happen to actually spend time in reality.

2. Dreamy monologue. Talking with another person without the partner ever responding. Constant satisfaction on a low level, since I've become fighting the addiction this is the most persistent. I suppose this is the result of forum lurking (I rarely post) which I've done for 3-4 years constantly. The setting used to be Youtube as well but as I've grown tired of vlogs it has gone away.

3. Chatter. Nearly subconscious, cannot describe it as I cannot pinpoint it. All I know is that this one gives me some kind of gratification while making sane thinking unavailable. Easy to stop but usually a prelude for the other two.

My main issue outside MD is anxiety. I suppose it's AvPD but I've never went to see a psychologist for those problems (I was forced to on multiple occasions ages 13-14). Then again, while the AvPD symptoms were crippling up to a year ago, they only provide a noticeable yet manageable hindrance nowadays.

My feelings over time are fairly cyclical. First I'm dreaming and bored, after a week or so I become enthusiastic about some subject (music, study, exercise, foreign language, programming etc etc etc).
The enthusiasm lasts for 3-4 days. During this I'll introduce myself to the subject and use the snippets of information to fuel my fantasies of being a master in the activity, conquering the world with never-before-seen talent and skill.
Next is the slump. I become depressed once I encounter a problem, I do nothing to improve my skill in the activity and only dream of mastery. The intensive phase of this lasts for a day or two, sometimes I'll become enthusiastic again but eventually I become hopeless.
Near the end daydreams of suicide or some way of overcoming the cycle are common. This dark period is around 4 days and once this ends the cycle begins again.

Triggers are usually people's opinions (I often lurk political forums imagining taking a contrarian stance), American tv storylines, any sort of praise or criticism in real life, learning new things (imagining being the master in the field), remembering old classmates and being pitied or felt for by people. I used to read and watch movies a lot and they were big triggers as well but this has stopped.

I am often envious of others which leads my daydreams to becoming vengeful and hurtful, obviously due to low self-esteem.

Social life is nonexistent. I have always deemed myself unworthy and incapable of meaningful emotional contact and an often-dreamt theme is improving myself up to the point where I can make friends. Even as a child I always felt unable to socialize as others could, it's as if I was born with the longing to connect but without the instinct that would tell me how to do that. I had some friends, playmates, up to age 9 or so, then only one. And the one friend I did have I never actually communicated with, we just bonded because of, I guess, a shared feeling of desertion.
I'm sure my MD is to a large degree due to being rejected by my peers during childhood. I had a funny name, funny teeth, funny looks and, the funniest of all, poor family. When I was 8 I started to cut myself off from others, at age of 12 I had little contact and by the time I was 14 I had little else but a few attempts to reach out left. I was always very observant of others (as much as I could without showing interest or making eye-contact) but was scared to death of trying to open myself up.
This is the solitude I've lived for 5 years now. I can't have any emotionally meaningful relations, with the only possible exception being my brother. Although my fear of people is subsiding and I'm not as anxious about talking to strangers as I used to be, I can see little possibility of companionship.

Oki, getting tired now but still haven't haven't said everything I set out to say. Will continue tomorrow. Kudos to anyone bothering to wade through it all :)

[Penguin]

Oki now.

A realization I came to a couple of days ago is that all my values and beliefs are worthless.

A lot of my DDs revolve around me arguing with someone and handing their asses to them. I do have opinions--apolitical reactionary, atheist, contrarian to the traditional values of my culture, opinions formed on observations of others' actions, whatever. Also, when I come across a new subject I dream of debating other stances in the field, all of which are based on snippets of information and positions of people I read a bitty bit about (wiki, bios, blogs, etc). My views are shallow as I usually pick up the information in the enthusiastic phase and then repeat them over and over in my dreams, usually gathering new info for the fantasies by half-arsedly lurking forums and and reading sensationalist articles.

I do scold myself for being opinionated while barely knowing the fundamentals of the subject, but it is without doubt that many of the views I hold are still the result of a dilettante's fantasy. Everything that I find interesting I quickly start dreaming about, new knowledge is always agreeing with the old one and fantasizing is always easier than studying.

Now, given how I form opinions and learn something new about stuff, everything comes under doubt. I don't really know anything enough to have a sincere position on. That means all the values I that guide me can be, and I think are, bullshit.

My memory is rubbish and as such I find it extremely difficult to go through all the things I do and have had views on (plus, y'know, I can't concentrate on finishing anyth) so I can't say with certainty that every single one of my opinions is the result of daydreaming, but I find such an exercise useless. I have never reasoned (before now) for any length of time longer than an instant outside the haze of fantasy. And my fantasies are, as best as I can ascertain, ways to cope with all the blows to my self-esteem, my beliefs can't be much further developed from such a petty cause.

The conclusion of the the thought is that I cannot trust any of my reactions to ideas and if I am committed to fighting this disease I must regard all my views as the result it, I must do away with them the same way I must do away with dreaming.

Now oki.



This is the second to last thought I want to post before bringing this post up-to-speed with where I'm at. Also, I am a bit tired and sickish so my writing might not be that coherent.

[Penguin]

I'll just keep updating in the comments.

The 5th of August I was finishing another cycle and being extremely depressed. Decided to start a journal to keep up with any progress. I didn't expect to continue with it but, against all odds, I have managed to at least write something every couple of days.

The first thing I realized is that this thought-pattern is a disease. I had been scolding myself for daydreaming before but that was usually at the end of the cycle, the next day I'd become hopeful of accomplishing something which, of course, only happened in my fantasies.

The next was trying to implement some kind of a routine. I started to fight the dreams about 5 seconds after they started. I only caught maybe a 6th of them but still had some results. I would (and still do to an extent) repeat Russian vocabulary--learning languages is a common enthusiasm and fantasy-theme for me--at the beginning of the daydream. This often worked but was followed by a very persistent urge of dreaming-of-a-time-when-I'm-not-dreaming, stopping that took yelling 'stop it!' five times in my head. This lasted for 6 days until I had really successful two hours and became mentally exhausted the next day, leading to some regression.

The two-hour sanity: On the 11th I had done pretty well during the day with my routine, that is, ultimately stopped only 20% or so, as well as keeping away all full-blown fantasies (1st cat). I was able to maintain my own voice without interruption. Got some concentrated study done, felt happy and calm but not elated (elated is bad, indicates enthusiasm), even fell asleep after only ten minutes. It usually takes me 90 minutes or so after lights out because I cannot stop myself from dreaming, and I cannot force myself to fight the dreams as I don't nod off if I don't let my mind take its course.

I consider those two hours to be very significant. I hadn't had even 5 minutes of clarity in my life as far as I can remember, two hours was just amazing. I did slump the next few days with the full-blown fantasies returning to pre-war levels but I'm not discouraged by that.

The next week was a struggle. After the clarity my mind was again quite foggy and I dreamed a lot. I became extremely angry and frustrated, nearly incapable of working (construction). I tried implementing some goals but failed (quit smoking, work out, clean my room etc).

18th - Sunday was calmer. Still futile attempts at setting goals but I did figure out how I've done wrong with studying Russian. At least I kept up proper nutrition and got some sleep as I had days off from work. I'm not too bothered by failing to make better progress as I'm used to disappointment.

On Sunday I found a link to the MD site on some anxiety forum. Joined this place, emailed Cynthia Schupak, became happy that this condition has a name and a few communities.

I know my life is still petty and pathetic but, considering how I was feeling a month ago, I've made some huge steps forward. I'm encouraged by my progress and committed (as much as commitment is possible for me) to dealing with this issue.

By the way, English is not my native tongue and, while I'm fairly confident in my ability to express my thoughts coherently, I know that I lack systematic knowledge of the language leading to some possibly confusing wording. If anyone bothers to actually read all of this and happens to not understand something I've said, please mention it so I can clarify.

Still haven't said all I have on my mind, I'll continue in the evening or tomorrow :)

[Penguin]

About the AvPD. The point I was going to make (but lost my due some weird inattentiveness) is that while I do have the symptoms of the disorder, given that I no longer seem to have it cripple my life, and reading how you, Cordellia, mentioned that even though you have all the symptoms of disorders yet are told by doctors that you do not have the diagnosis, I might as well disregard it. That is, disregard thoughts of it, if it ain't done properly (shrink), if it ain't stopping me from functioning (even if it's hard) and if I haven't done a lot of reading on the subject, giving myself a label is pointless, even if I match the symptoms perfectly.

[Cordellia Amethyste Rose]

This is very interesting. I have the same problems with memories. I have to create an algorithm to do anything, or I'll daze off & forget. I have notebooks full of simple daily lists. I'm still not convinced it's AvPD, but it's not up to me. Only you can truly know what's going on in your head. I have pretty crippling anxiety, too. It's a hindrance, but also a destructive remedy, as panicking over not doing things is the only thing that motivates me to do them at times. I need a better one. Anyway, documenting your thoughts may help you get perspective on them. It'll also help others who are going through the same thing but too shy to talk about it yet.