Hello!

[Mary]

Hello! I'm new to the community. I don't know when I started MDing, exactly, but it was when I was in eighth grade that I started the pacing, and it got more frequent. That's when I started online school and didn't really have any friends. I felt isolated and weird, so it was a nice way to play pretend and imagine a world where I was pretty, thin (I was very insecure about my weight), and successful, where I traveled and constantly got to see new things and meet new people-- and where I didn't have to deal with my family.
I've done it up to now, age 27. Sometimes it's more intense. Days off work spent totally in this other world, from the minute I wake up to when I go to sleep. When I'm in a new place and feel unsettled and insecure I don't do it as much. It's when the newness wears off and the routine starts to get to me, that it creeps its way back in.
I have a lot of social anxiety. MDing helps me cope with being out in the world, where I feel out of place and insecure and afraid. Also helps me to deal with the loneliness at home, because I don't have any friends and my family are all spread across the country and busy with their own lives. ALSO also, makes work a little less boring, as most of my jobs (I've moved and switched jobs a lot) aren't very stimulating and don't fill me with a sense of purpose.
I'm trying to stop again but it's hard. I just think of all the time I wasted NOT living. I don't think MD alone is the cause, but that's always been part of its allure: when I feel like I'm not enough, it's too late and the die has been cast, I can escape to my daydreams. The world can just feel so empty and I think it won't get better, I won't get better, I'll never find people who love me for me. I know that's not true but it really feels that way, sometimes. At least the people in my head love me. A version of me, anyway.
My health insurance kicks in next week so I'm keen to start therapy and get some help with the underlying issues (depression and anxiety). I've also told a couple family members about it, having previously been too ashamed to let anyone else know, so that's real progress.
Anyway, that's my intro. Lovely to be here (I think)! Better than suffering in silence, in any case.

[Jessica Ballantyne]

Thing is I thought everything will come true out of my dreams. When really, I was just having these dreams, but not using them to guide me on the way, and work very hard for where I want to be. I nearly put myself in some limbo as a result. When people were alerting me of what they saw I was doing—I wish that I woke up—and realized they were right about me. And saw a therapist even then. At 20 I was naive that way, and dumb about life itself. MD seemed so utopia back then. It was like I was on crack, so I didn't care. I loved it. 

[Jessica Ballantyne]

I never tell people, yes for the reason, they think that's nuts. It's not an easy thing for anyone to swallow that you daydream in the day. To them, it's weird and far out, and anxiety ridden. They probably wonder "How do you have a life, when you don't pay attention all day?" They may even think we're sick. Who knows. 

I'm coping and actually stopped doing MDD. I'm a regular temporary these days. I guess it's cause I'm overly concerned and worried about my future and life circumstances that I can't dream. So it's all good. Most of it's in the past, and luckily, I condemned that past. 

[Mary]

That all sounds super traumatizing. I'm so sorry it's been like that! Do you have any support system at all? Socializing is super hard for me as well. I really don't know where to even start. I guess maybe you just say things, and then more things, and see what happens? I'll have to try it sometime and see.
I'm on the verge of telling my employers I have to leave and going to live with my brother for a bit because I cannot cope on my own (not just MD stuff, the anxiety and depression have hit a peak, though I think it made it easier for me to ignore those things and pretend they would just fix themselves one day or I might magically find the answer inside myself to "untraumatize" me). It's hard to do, when being a hard worker and being able to live on my own were what kept me from feeling like I'd totally failed at life. I'm optimistic and confident in myself, for the first time ever, but it also hurts to admit I'm incapable of standing on my own or helping myself with my own mental issues.
I hope you get some help! It's hard enough to deal with MDD and all the shame attached to it-- and being so lonely-- without other people judging you for it. It's definitely an unusual thing I want to talk to more people about, but it's also quite hard, cause it sounds a bit insane.

[Jessica Ballantyne]

I am aware of how you feel. I too, started MDD in 6th grade. I did attend classes onsite, but reason I started living in other worlds is that I was socially outcasted with no friends. I felt lonely, awkward and unwanted. I didn't talk very much, was painfully quiet, and had Asperger syndrome too, so I had no social interaction skills. MDD helped me cope with my losses and frustrations of not belonging to a crowd, or with anybody. But also, I was heavily bullied in school, and the way people aggressed on me and spoke to me is something you can't "unsee." 

Eventually, MDD turned out to be a big regrettable mistake, especially when I became an adult. I had cares and responsibilities, had to support myself someday. Worst yet, my mom ultimately found out my "daydream life" and she wasn't happy about it—at all. She was so furious. My MDD ways bled out in my behaviour and inability to communicate properly, so it wasn't hard for anybody to find out that I was a space cadet. Can you picture in your head how humiliating and utterly terrible it is for somebody to sniff what's happening in that bubble of yours—and break out in some unforgettable fit of rage or upset, or like they've just seen a ghost?? I think my Asperger syndrome made it too explicable. 

Like you, I hopped jobs so much, but I couldn't afford to move out. I don't talk to my family very much, so they have no perception of what I'm feeling and thinking. And they continue to complain of my *cough* daydreams. Meanwhile, I'm just nonexistent to the outside world. I might as well be stuck in a thick glass case.

I'm unsuccessful, with no friends, unemployed and don't have my own house—in my 30's. I'm scraping by wondering what to do next, every single day. My MDD has dwindled, because I now realize what a disgraceful situation I put myself in. 

Like You, I really should seek therapy or see a psychiatrist for dreamers.