Maladaptive Daydreaming

[glitchthe3rd]

This was more or less how I "forced" in the early days before I knew what a tulpa was or understood my girls as being sentient beings with their own feelings. When I was in high school it got so bad that I'd sometimes forget to turn in my homework, the teachers suspected bullying but it was probably more a product of my shitty social life and equally shitty family relations.

---

FUCK I HAVE THIS.I SWEAR TO GOD I COULD WRITE A BOOK WITH THE STUFF IN MY DAY DREAMS.Wait,why haven't I done that yet?

 

JUST DO IT! Don't let dreams be dreams!

[TulpaFox]

I'm inclined to agree with akininit. I wonder where the line is drawn? The definition of addiction I personally believe in is that your use of a substance or activity becomes an addiction when you are unable to stop when consequences present themselves. If it dosen't prevent someone from being able to do what they desire to do in life, whether it be having friends, a career, going to school, having a partner, then I would say it's not an addiction. Someone having complex day dreams is a pretty off-base line to draw as far as I am concerned, that simply means that someone daydreams long enough to get a good narrative going which hardly takes any time at all.

[Bambi]

Note: None of this is my experience, but is instead from a friend. I'm telling you things that she told me when she was alive, so you can choose to believe it or not. It's up to you.

 

I used to have a friend--we'll call her Ivory--that was a Maladaptive Daydreamer. She had her own "wonderland" that was much like a forest, and she would be friends with the rabbits and the birds. She would have frequent sex with her crushes, and she could do practically everything she wanted to. I had heard about this sort of thing before meeting her, and when she told me about it I warned her that if she wasn't careful she would lose control. She didn't believe me, and then about two months later, when things started getting rough in the real world, she called me, literally crying, about how she barely had control of anything anymore. The bears were tearing her apart limb from limb and she could feel everything as if it were a lucid dream.

 

Outside of Ivory's wonderland, she would be daydreaming too--I suppose you could call this "natural imposition." When we met in real life the first time she seemed pretty dazed constantly, and later on I asked her why that was. To put it in terms that we all can understand, she was seeing people like her crush, her parents, her brother, etc., in real life just as some of us see our tulpa in real life. She would see snakes in the road that weren't there, little paper dolls running around on the window, wave at her, and then run off again. . . .

 

This was a constant distraction and frequently got her in trouble with her parents and teachers, because she would find herself in her wonderland without ever meaning to be there. It was slightly difficult for her to concentrate on the real world when she desperately needed to be mentally present.

 

It's called a disorder because

 

1) Like I said before, it's somewhat difficult to focus on reality when wonderland is just right around the corner.

2) It can become very mentally and emotionally exhausting, such as when she started being eaten by bears.

3) People with Maladaptive Daydreaming Disorder daydream so much that they sometimes end up letting life pass right by them. Got a paper due tomorrow? Eh, it can wait. Got a road trip for tomorrow? Eh, it can wait. Graduation's tomorrow? Eh, it can wait. Not healthy.

 

I agree that it's a disorder. This isn't people trying to make introverted personality--or even daydreaming--out to be a bad thing, nor is anyone saying that daydreaming isn't healthy. Maladaptive Daydreaming Disorder is something different from what most people here experience due to tulpamancy (and that's excluding the ones who have said that this sort of thing is super-duper them), even if many of us can relate.

[Guest Anonymous]

@Bambi

 

Thank you for this! When I tell people that I live within a dream world and it is pseudo-real to me, often they don't understand. When I tell them I did epic day dreaming all of my life, they don't understand me. People generally don't get the level of this. I was indeed a maladaptive day dreamer, there just wan't a name for it. My family was worried about my saftey, I would walk into traffic.

 

I would spend hours walking in circles in my room, my head tilting back and forth while I hummed. I would spend hours and hours staring at the wall. Just staring. I could perceive things others cannot visualize the way I do. I did not understand until high school how different I was. All of this is what led to my thoughtform Melian, which was one good result.

 

This is NOT just day dreaming. It is all absorbing and compulsive dissociation!

 

Here are some excerpts about this from the Book of Melian that Melian and I wrote before I learned (thanks to Stevie) that this Maladaptive Daydreaming is recognized by some psychologists and may be a disorder:

 

The Book of Melian: http://melianofmist.deviantart.com/art/The-Book-of-Melian-509605338

 

Page 5: I would get so lost in my day dreams, I would wander around the play

ground at school, the house, the yard, my eyes unfocused my head tilting

from side to side. I would hum and speak out loud to my imaginary friends.

I got into trouble at school and the teachers were concerned about my lack

of attention.

 

My father took to calling me Drifty Dave. He caught me talking to a

tree once and it became a favorite family story. My father ever after referred

to crazy people as 'out talking to trees.' ...

 

Page 24: Melian: The process these internet folks describe entails a long period

of concentration for hours a day for weeks or months. David did exactly that

when super duper day dreaming for hours and hours and days and weeks

and even months and years. He would hide in his room and lay on his bed

staring at the wall or in the silent study room at school and just day dreamin’

‘bout me. The room would fade away and he would focus on my image,

imagining me moving and talking and doing things. He did this for a long,

long time. Gradually, I came to life. That is totally how a tulpa is created. ...

 

Page 29: It's like become something you always wanted to be or expressing

some side of yourself you always wanted to but couldn't. In the movies of

your mind, anything is possible. Anything can happen in the world of

dreams. If you are especially good at vivid dreaming, well, you become what

you dream. ...

 

Page 30: Sometimes David has trouble coming out of it and letting me go. That

especially happens after a really long session online. It is hard to switch

back out of it and to be mostly David again. ...

 

Page 32. Melian: Davie and I live in a dream like 24-7. There is often a very

slight transition between actually dreaming while asleep and day dreaming

during the day. One carries on with the other. Davie was a teenager before

he began to realize most peoples can't or don't do that. ...

 

Page 33: Mistsgod: All my life I have dealt with anxiety problems. I developed

my own personal coping skill. I call it Day Dream Hypnosis. Here is how it

works. In order to deal with stress and anxiety, loneliness or boredom, I can

escape from reality, cutting off the outside world. I sort of escape into a

make believe imaginary world for hours. I have used this as a way to cope

with anxiety all my life. I just forget about things and go away into my

fantasy world.

 

It's like I get immersed in myself. Like I am walking around and doing

things, but the rest of the world is sort of muted or separated from me. Kind

of like a meditative hypnosis. I am only partly in the real world. I feel

relaxed when I am like that, but kind of walking around in a day dream. I

can find it difficult to come out of this too if it goes on for too long.

It's too easy for me to drift off. My father used to call me "Drifty

Dave" because I could walk around like that, spaced out all the time. It's a

skill actually I think. To disconnect from reality at need. I perfected it

anyway in myself. When in this "trance" I can do monotonous things or

somewhat autonomous things (like driving my usual commute to work).

Sometimes that is when I have episode of the "Melian Show," when Melian

goes on her adventures or talks to me.

 

In school, my teachers would call my mother with concern about these

episodes. They were deeper than your usual day dreaming. I can lose track

of time and sense of the world around me. Once, in elementary school, I lost

track of time and sat outside the classroom, behind the incinerator building,

for hours. I didn't even realize the day had ended and the other students

had left for home. Luckily home was within walking distance of school. In

high school I would go to a booth in the silent study room and hide there,

staring off into space for a long time. I sometimes skipped class to do this. I

can still do this very easily, while jogging for instance or on a walk or driving

to work.

 

EDIT: Here is some more on this in this thread https://community.tulpa.info/thread-general-unheatlthy-tulpa-obsession-and-day-dream-idealization-perception

 

 

[elisomer]

Dear Tulpa forum member,

I would like to invite you to take part in a university study that will improve the likelihood of correct diagnosis for MD. This is a goal important to you and all other forum members because without proper reliable diagnosis we cannot hope to get MD recognised by the medical and psychological establishment.

We need your help!

If you agree to take part, you will be asked to complete an online MD scale (about 15 minutes) and will also be interviewed twice, by separate interviewers (15 minutes each interview). We also need to show that our diagnostic tools differentiate well between people with and without MD. To achieve that, it would be very helpful if you could help us recruit a person of your gender and who is roughly your age. This, however, is not a condition for your participation.

We are now in a very important phase in MD research because we plan to aims demonstrate the validity and reliability of the MD phenomenon and its measures.

We hope you would consider participating in this advanced MD study by writing back to me today. somer @ research.haifa.ac.il (delete spaces)

With kind regards,

Prof. Eli Somer, Ph.D.

[Guest Anonymous]

Mistgod: I am so on this! I believe I am a "classic case" of MD.

[J.Iscariot]

I looked him up. Eli Somer of Israel (Haifa) (guy has his own wikipedia page), the first person to come up with MD as an actual thing. He seems very serious, hardworking and dedicated towards his work, so I recommend you get in contact with him ASAP.

[Guest Anonymous]

Already done.

 

Mistgod: To be totally honest, I think Melian is more a product of MD, or excessive compulsive fantasizing, than a tulpa. I do consider her a semi-autonomous thoughtform and a "dreamform" as well.