Long Daydreams & How do I stop?

[Alisha Mansoor]

How long did one of your daydreams last? Mine has been going on for 8 and half months, the same characters and mostly the same storyline. It’s from a really popular book series, so it’s worse when someone mentions it. :( I’ve tried to stop but end up relapsing.

i also don’t want to completely stop my daydreams, I just want control. I want to be able to read without daydreaming! What should I do?

[Hayley]

Mine can last for years. I think my longest is three years. Once I get tired of the same characters and exhaust all storylines I  move on to another 'world'. Fresh storylines and characters then feed the addiction and it starts over. 

I feel you. I find it hard to watch TV or go about my daily tasks without getting lost in my daydreams. Not sure what the answer is just know there are others that feel what you feel. 

[Silver Swan]

I used to have long day dreams that lasted a couple years, especially if I had crushes on the characters. They eventually got tiresome and past their prime, so I'd move onto another 'world.' I grew up and woke up to the fact I have to support myself, being awake and ready for the real world. My family household was very stern and I had to do what was told of me. My family also discovered that I've been doing maladaptive daydreaming and wasn't happy at all. So, I just about got into hot water for it. Also, I was starting out on my career and had all sorts of contract jobs that needed my full attention. Very few of my employers ever found out about my daydreaming, but they did wonder if I was deaf.

These days, I don't let myself get sucked into other worlds. Reason is, I still want so many opportunities that I never got when I was younger. I want to be loved and liked by people. I want to travel the world (I've been a recluse for 8 years). I want to get myself a life; most of the time, I feel as if I'm living for my parents. I was hoping to enter a relationship, maybe even get married, possibly even have a kid. I'm actually on the autism spectrum, so everything is kind of rough right now. So, I feared if I went back into MDD, more years will go by, and I would've been too 'zoned out' to do anything about it.

[Kitt Coltrane]

Something that works for me is setting aside time for daydreaming, and only being allowed to dd between 30 minutes and an hour a day. This makes sure you don’t let it get in the way of your life. 

[dark thoughts]

Have you tried confining your daydream to a set time? Focus on work at work, other things as needed, but build daydream time into your schedule. I have very long extensive constantly evolving daydreams, often lasting several months to years. I'm able to refocus when I need to, and also am quite adept at functioning in a "normal" manner why dreaming, I'm able to mentally juggle several things at once. Just the way I am. Maybe because I've been this way all my life, I didn't know othr people did the same thing. I just became adept at hiding it so they didn't think I was weird or crazy.

Everybody is different, so I think it might be a matter of finding what works for you- either free flowing whenever, if you can still get life done with it; or incorporating dream time into your schedule.

[Beef]

I have many different ongoing storylines, I move between them as I fancy, the longest has lasted 8 years, I just keep changing the storyline and adding characters and developing existing characters in it's massive cast.

[Silver Swan]

I have created worlds that look similar to cinematic scenery. Other times, my world appeared like they came out of an illustrated biblical book or a painting depicting legendary people.

Whichever way, whenever I just want to live in these worlds, I forget that people are noticing that I don't think of others in the household and won't listen up—even behave like a real adult. 

I've even had non-family that picked up the fact I'm not with it, while I'm living these alternate worlds. I've even tried so hard to drop MDD to protect myself from future accusations. I am on the Autism Spectrum, which makes my situation a whole degree more difficult, compared to neurotypicals. So, these days, I keep on having to suppress day dreaming more than ever.

[MrsChapman]

I have a rotation of three different daydreams, that's been ongoing for at least a year and a half. The themes of those three are very similar always involving myself and a famous person that I have a crush on. All feature some aspect of travel - I'm never in my home town. All involve some scene of meeting this person.

I'm able to pull myself away when needed and engage my family or my work (I work from a home office which actually makes it easier to hide my MD's), so I guess I call myself a "functional" maladaptive daydreamer. But because of the nature of them, how frequently I lapse into them, and the sometimes salacious nature of daydreaming about someone who is not my husband I feel deep shame. If feel like I'm cheating in my mind, even if I would never stray from my marriage in real life. I wish I could just stop.

[Silver Swan]

My dad's been married to my mother for 37 years, and he's always had a crush on a Hollywood actress. In fact, he admired Jessica Lane so much, back in the 80's, that he and my mom agreed to name me after her—"Jessica." They gave me the middle name "Natalie" after Natalie Wood. Currently, he has a crush on Rosamund Pike. It's none of my business what his fantasies with Rosamund look like. He probably doesn't fantasize at all, as he's definitely not the daydreamer type, and he just has a crush on Rosamund when watching her in a movie. Still, I find it interesting that he's got my mother and he still has crushes on celebrities.

[Alisha Mansoor]

Yes I have tried to give time to daydream, but I’m really weak so I just slowly let myself daydream more and more and soon I’m just daydreaming all the time, :/ 

[JoeyT]

44 years. Since 1974. It helped me fall asleep and still does. It is less and less as I get older. I still do it. The room has to be absolutely silent. No distractions like music or TV. Maybe it is a coping mechanism. I do have a fairly normal life on the outside. A job, kids, a house.  A lot from daydreams years ago have actually happened in the past few years.  Nobody would ever know what goes on in my mind from the outside. I keep it that way. 

[Sian]

Mine started in 1979, though admittedly I did succeed in dropping it for a good few years, only for it to re-emerge when I was through a difficult time. Like you it's based around something real (a tv series ). The only way I have found of controlling it is avoid that tv series like the plague. The Internet does not help, because its there on tap all the time, and you have to have a will power of steel not to relapse.