[HN Gopher] How too much daydreaming affected me
___________________________________________________________________
How too much daydreaming affected me
Author : SunghoYahng
Score : 162 points
Date : 2023-07-25 11:06 UTC (1 days ago)
(HTM) web link (sunghoyahng.substack.com)
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| [deleted]
| [deleted]
| marcusverus wrote:
| [dead]
| jkingsman wrote:
| > Two theories are popular among the MD community. One attributes
| MD to a lack of emotional nurturing in childhood, leading to
| issues in emotional expressivity. It advocates emotional
| engagement with real life as a potential solution. The second
| theory suggests that daydream immersion is an innate trait and MD
| develops when people with this trait become addicted to
| daydreaming due to unfortunate real-life circumstances.
|
| I'm surprised not to see consideration of this as a biochemical
| phenomenon (beyond the reductive "everything in the brain is
| biochemical") -- I wonder if an anatomical or signal/chemical
| oddity could put someone in a state where they're predisposed to
| switch on the dreaming/imagining circuits in the middle of tasks,
| almost like a very odd flavor of narcolepsy (which, among other
| causes, is commonly associated with the immune system destroying
| cells that produce a likely wakefulness-signalling protein).
| anjc wrote:
| Is daydreaming as maladaptive as it's presented? For me it's more
| like scenario planning than nonsense dreaming. Even if 90% is
| fruitless, 10% have fed into real life decisions that have had
| real life outcomes.
|
| An extreme example is that "call of the void" feeling one gets
| when standing beside a large drop. Is it daydreaming to engage
| with this feeling in this scenario, or is it an intuitive way to
| reinforce positive decisions?
| soulofmischief wrote:
| > My daydreaming isn't merely a passive pastime. It interrupts my
| daily tasks, making conspicuous appearances. Often, I find myself
| vocalizing thoughts, not as a narration of my actions, but
| broadcasting the intricate details of my daydreams. I often find
| myself taking spontaneous walks, even breaking into a run
| sometimes. Might seem like random movements, but it's my vivid
| daydreams pulling the strings. I can suddenly burst into laughter
| or find myself pacing in circles.
|
| Well I feel seen today. At times in my youth I seriously
| questioned whether I had schizophrenia... but I never developed
| the symptoms.
|
| What I do have seems to be a mixture of OCD-related intrusive
| thoughts and a serious problem with daydreaming/dissociation that
| severe ADHD thus far has seemed to acceptably explain. But ADHD
| doesn't explain the deep daydreaming and sudden talking out loud,
| entire days spent in a catatonic state, etc.
|
| > For instance, remembering routes or even simple details like
| the layout of a frequently visited place demands active
| processing from me
|
| People have definitely commented on my trouble remembering
| recently taken routes... always just hard to know how common
| this. A general sense of navigation seems to make up for it but
| it takes many, many trips for me to not get lost when I move to a
| new location.
|
| > Even simple tasks, which involve a few steps (like taking
| medicine or changing clothes), can turn into a time-consuming
| endeavor due to the interruptions caused by daydreaming
|
| Most definitely, and again the presence of ADHD makes this
| difficult to isolate and understand. I mean, all of these these
| are definitely potential symptoms of ADHD. It just seems to not
| be the usual case for people I meet with ADHD. It becomes
| extremely difficult making friends, even ones with ADHD,
| understand what I go through. Most write it off as me being
| dramatic about everyday experiences that everyone has, not
| understanding the acute or chronic nature of the symptoms.
|
| A friend recently told me I paid too much attention to diagnoses,
| but I have had these diagnoses for my entire life and they affect
| me in such an extreme way that the only progress I have made has
| been with deep, thorough medical research about my conditions.
| Even past childhood therapists totally misunderstood these
| conditions and sometimes made things worse.
|
| > Similarly, changing clothes can take more than an hour.
| Sometimes, I don't manage to complete the task at all.
|
| Yeah, and for me at least there is often an element of PTSD from
| childhood and early adulthood trauma which guides these
| daydreams, and it honestly sounds like the case for the author
| here, if I had to wager a guess I'd assume most of these
| daydreams are rooted in either some kind of direct trauma, or a
| some desire which is propelled by a hidden underlying trauma.
|
| > For clarity, it's important to underline that MD-affected
| individuals can clearly differentiate between reality and
| daydreams.
|
| Unfortunately, my experience has been that trying to relate the
| experience of compulsive daydreaming or other extreme facets of
| ADHD only come across as unhinged to others, especially when you
| mention things like the radio in your brain you just cannot turn
| off which interrupts every other thought, or how you might
| randomly laugh or respond out loud to an imagined conversation in
| your head.
|
| For my part, I am a lifelong lucid dreamer with the ability to
| modify my dreams, and also suffer from frequent sleep paralysis.
| In general I have had extreme insomnia my entire life, which
| leads to a false sort of narcolepsy throughout the day. Last
| night I got maybe an hour of sleep in total, 10 minute increments
| followed by an hour of tossing and turning in between. I would be
| surprised if these things are not all related.
|
| Stress also definitely seems to affect this condition. This past
| week has been immensely stressful and I spent several hours today
| on my floor just totally in another world.
| Mezzie wrote:
| > Yeah, and for me at least there is often an element of PTSD
| from childhood and early adulthood trauma which guides these
| daydreams, and it honestly sounds like the case for the author
| here, if I had to wager a guess I'd assume most of these
| daydreams are rooted in either some kind of direct trauma, or a
| some desire which is propelled by a hidden underlying trauma.
|
| I have MD but not ADHD and I know my MD is directly trauma
| related: My earliest memories of my MD from age 4 or 5 involved
| me being adopted by/having loving caregivers.
| scottyah wrote:
| How many hours per week do you do moderate+ exercise?
| Specifically things that require coordination and focus.
| soulofmischief wrote:
| Exercise, being non-sedentary, is definitely critical. I work
| from home, so to start I switch it up with a standing desk
| half the time and also try to work from multiple places
| throughout the house.
|
| I do a light routine 3-4x a week. I also keep a pull-up bar a
| few feet from my desk and hit it all day, along with a couple
| minutes of pushups/squats/etc during some work breaks.
| Keeping up with it can be extremely hard due to ADHD and some
| external life factors. This includes flexibility training.
| Just about the only thing I don't do is run often, due to
| chronic sciatica and flat feet. Still having a hard time with
| my weight because apparently a chronic lack of sleep can
| cause your daily fat loss to cut in half or more. [0] I'm
| already eating around 1500 calories a day and still at a
| weight plateau. I do take vitamins. But the exercise still
| helps, endorphins are great.
|
| Any suggestions? What works for you?
|
| [0] https://www.webmd.com/diet/sleep-and-weight-loss
| mrangle wrote:
| >Well I feel seen today. At times in my youth I seriously
| questioned whether I had schizophrenia... but I never developed
| the symptoms.
|
| Autism has seeming yet superficial symptomatic crossover with
| schizophrenia to the point that only a professional, or
| otherwise someone skilled at differential diagnosis, could
| discern the difference.
|
| >What I do have seems to be a mixture of OCD-related intrusive
| thoughts and a serious problem with daydreaming/dissociation
| that severe ADHD thus far has seemed to acceptably explain.
|
| Autism explains these.
|
| >But ADHD doesn't explain the deep daydreaming and sudden
| talking out loud, entire days spent in a catatonic state, etc.
|
| ADHD-PI would explain daydreaming. A habit of talking out loud
| can be due to isolated lifestyle and / or stress. Altogether,
| it reads as a possibility of autism (formerly known as
| Asperger's).
| kayodelycaon wrote:
| > A friend recently told me I paid too much attention to
| diagnoses
|
| Oh dear... that's not how executive function disorders work.
| It's not lack of focus, it's an inability to direct focus.
| soulofmischief wrote:
| At least the friends who suggest meditation are onto
| something. When I was a child I discovered meditation and it
| became a crucial coping mechanism.
|
| It's just that most of these people think meditation will
| _solve_ the problem, not realizing that ADHD
|
| - makes it harder to even begin meditating than for the
| average person
|
| - makes it harder to stick with the habit
|
| - makes it harder to _actually do_ because the mind is racing
| as a default and not because of stresses
|
| - only treats the symptoms and does not cure them
| kpw94 wrote:
| How much do you listen to music?
|
| Read somewhere that listening to music can trigger MD, is that
| the case for you? (Do you get less MD if you don't listen to
| music that day?)
| Mezzie wrote:
| My MD is really music triggered. I basically can't listen to
| music without daydreaming. If I want sound but not to daydream,
| I have to listen to brown noise/rain/cafe noises.
| barrysteve wrote:
| It's possible to imagine forever until you hit a brick wall.
| Objective fact, atheistic aggression and 'keeping it real' used
| to be exit doors for daydreaming.
|
| We don't do any of that anymore. It has helped me to study the
| effects of electronics on the nervous system. Many of our
| automatic behaviours can be supercharged by electronics.
| pxc wrote:
| As an atheist and a lifelong daydreamer, I don't think atheism
| (or even antitheism) are opposed to daydreaming at all. You
| don't have to believe that some possible thing is actual just
| to daydream about it! That's kinda what makes daydreaming what
| it is. Why can't (or shouldn't) atheists daydream about
| anything-- even gods?
| sidewndr46 wrote:
| what is "atheistic aggression" ?
| nottorp wrote:
| they eat a baby for breakfast then look at him funny
| marketerinland wrote:
| Having read some of the comments from this account, I suspect
| that it's some kind of AI bot
| zer0tonin wrote:
| I actually experienced this during my late childhood and teenage
| years. I would say between age 8-16.
|
| I think the main cause was actually under-stimulation: I was both
| very socially reclusive, and bored to death by schoolwork. I
| would guess that my brain was trying to compensate for the lack
| of social life and things to do by making up people and scenarios
| were stuff actually happens.
|
| This tendency to constantly daydream faded away as I gained
| independance and entered adulthood. Since I had more stuff to do
| and more people to talk to. It kinda re-appeared during the
| 2020-2021 lockdowns, since boredom came back. I think I had
| almost forgot how it felt to intensely daydream at that point.
| GonGonBungaBoom wrote:
| As a kid board outta my mind watching my sisters ballet class,
| long car/bus rides, I agree with under stimulus from personal
| experience.
| myth2018 wrote:
| Similar experience here. Daydreaming happens more often as I
| spend extended periods alone, sometimes to a point I would also
| call "maladaptive". I'm looking for ways to deal with that. It
| often prevents me to make any meaningful advance on hobbies or
| any other activity for whose outcome there's nobody waiting --
| hence, I have a number of unfinished stuff laying around and
| getting dust.
|
| I agree with your thesis of under-stimulation. I wouldn't say
| I'm too reclusive, but social activities in general have been
| not particularly engaging, sometimes even a bit tiring.
| victorantos wrote:
| It's intriguing to hear how you connected this phenomenon to
| under-stimulation, where your social reclusiveness and lack of
| engaging activities at school may have led your brain to
| compensate by creating vivid imaginary scenarios and people.
|
| Daydreaming, to some extent, is a natural and common human
| experience, and it can serve various functions, such as
| providing an escape from the mundane or offering a way to
| process emotions and desires. Your account sheds light on how
| changes in our environment and daily life can impact the
| frequency and intensity of daydreaming.
| lazide wrote:
| It's also a common defense against some other actual
| circumstance going on that is too difficult to handle, as is
| pulling away from people in general.
|
| Interestingly, as we move out, we often change the set of
| people we interact with. Healthier or not, it does change the
| stimulus and environment in meaningful ways.
| slothtrop wrote:
| Conventional wisdom is that it's good to allow kids to be bored
| (by which this generally means: not intervening as a parent
| with an activity) as this will compel them to take action,
| creatively or otherwise. It just might not be the actions
| parents expect. You can take away the tv, but that doesn't
| automatically mean your kid will color or build a fort.
|
| I think "spontaneity" is informed in large part by habit. If
| you teach a kid to build things, how to draw, read, etc, they
| might be more inclined to explore this out of their own
| volition.
|
| I mostly daydreamed. I had crayons and paper, but was not
| compelled to use them that often. The Legos collected dust
| after I followed along with the schematics.
| softsound wrote:
| As someone miserably bored a lot, I think the habit really is
| more important then forced boredom. Also having someone to
| work with will always likely make you more creative, I don't
| think being bored has ever really made me more creative but
| having freetime to burn has. If you are so bored you sleep
| through a lecture it's pointless, at least I could draw
| through a lot of the ones I was in.
| aaarrm wrote:
| I actually feel like under-stimulation has caused me to lose
| the ability to daydream somewhat. I used to have moments in my
| imagination and I loved it, and then around ~17 or so it all
| went away. I've been trying to get it back ever since, but I
| haven't been able to pin down the how or why.
|
| At this point I feel my imagination is very untrained, and
| since it is like a muscle, I need to practice somehow. But I
| believe the patterns I've instilled in my day-to-day, along
| with my anxieties around life have forced my imagination into a
| standstill. Unengaging forms of consumption, ADHD causing me to
| avoid stimulating tasks, anxiety guiding nearly all of my
| thoughts all come together to make me have no time or
| willingness to daydream anymore.
| IAmNotACellist wrote:
| Try doing what Jung did, and keep a dream journal. Use it
| every morning. It helps form connections between your
| creative unconscious and your ability to perceive and
| verbalize it in waking life.
| irrational wrote:
| My dream journal would be blank. In my 50+ years of life, I
| have never woken up and remembered anything from the moment
| I fell asleep. As far as I can tell, I experience dreamless
| sleep.
| vorpalhex wrote:
| This is going to be odd advice but please give it a try
| anyways.
|
| Do the dream journal process regardless. It is totally
| fine to wake up, take out the dream journal, write "I had
| no dreams" and the date and call it an entry.
|
| Try it, ideally two weeks, but give it at least ten days.
|
| There's a really good (but not 100%) chance you do have
| dreams but just really don't recall them - but you may
| start to capture fragments by attempting to describe them
| first thing.
|
| And it really does have to be first thing. Before you
| play with your phone or brush your teeth. As soon as you
| can move, grab and start writing.
| Mezzie wrote:
| This is so weird to me: I've always had really good
| memories of my dreams. About 80% of nights I end up lucid
| dreaming too.
| DANmode wrote:
| I'd love to be in contact with you, just because of this.
| Mezzie wrote:
| I also have dream continuity which I've gathered is
| fairly weird? Like there are consistent physical and
| 'multiversal' rules and I can visit the same places over
| and over + have impacts that last from one dream session
| to another.
|
| I can also read which apparently isn't universal.
| throwbadubadu wrote:
| Amazing! Hope it is not impolite to ask: I assume even
| nothing if you just doze away and something wakes you
| quickly again (I believe many have the mind wandering,
| crazy thoughts, but no visual dreams there)?
|
| Can you doze at all, or is it always quick deep sleep?
| (would sound desirable)
|
| Do you have or feel any impact, any disadvantages?
| Because sometimes a lot beyond the basic sleep is
| attributed to being able to dream?
| nanidin wrote:
| Dream journaling improves dream recall. You have to do it
| right away as you may forget you even dreamt within a few
| minutes.
| eastbound wrote:
| Do you snore? Since getting a mouth thingy to push the
| lower jaw forward, liberating the throat, I snore much
| less and I dream much more and wake up remembering the
| dreams! But the effects only lasted until my throat got a
| little more fat.
| AlanSE wrote:
| The ideal conditions to stimulate daydreaming seems pretty
| obvious to me - sit me down in any class lecture.
|
| Imagine that my mind like a glider. Glider is connected to a
| Cessna by a tether, but it's a magical tether that can
| disappear. In fact, it takes me active work to keep it
| connected, like I'm holding on to the end of the rope with my
| hands. The plane takes off and I'm following in lockstep
| about the main subject matter... looking down at the
| landscape below, to the left, to the right. After a quick
| climb, and at velocity, I've forgotten about keeping
| tethered, holy crud, I'm in the air! I want to bank, dive,
| maybe loop! What's over here? I can catch a thermal and go on
| forever depending on the landscape, but still often see more
| appealing currents and need to switch over. Oh wait, where
| did the plane go?
| siva7 wrote:
| I also believe that MD is the result of under-stimulation in
| childhood among other factors for those whose mind has a
| greater need for stimulation but i don't believe there is a
| cure once it manifests. Getting more other stimuli to prevent
| the typical episodes is somehow akin to a drug user in need for
| the next high to "function" - it can get easily out of control.
| It is for sure one of the most fascinating disorders - and also
| one of the best hidden.
| formulathree wrote:
| [dead]
| whywhywhywhy wrote:
| Just want to actually dream a lot lately to be honest. Find
| myself wasting a up to at least lunchtime on a Saturday if I get
| the type of sleep that gives consecutive dreams.
| adamwong246 wrote:
| I find it weird that the writer wrote so much without saying,
| precisely, the nature of the day-dreams. Perhaps not so much
| Maladaptive Daydreaming as Maladaptive Living? If these thoughts
| consume you, maybe you need to make a more tangible change in
| your life than pathologizing your own thoughts. Don't dream it,
| be it, you know?
| blackkettle wrote:
| I also found it odd looking through the whole piece waiting for
| an example only to reach the end with no idea what these
| daydreams actually are?
| feintruled wrote:
| I have this (or something like it). You basically can retreat
| into a fantasy world that plays out like a movie with
| yourself as the main character. You can run through any
| number of imagined Walter Mitty scenarios and feel at least
| some echo of the emotions - enough to make it quite
| addictive. It's your standard power fantasy stuff really -
| imagine the gamut of those Reddit anecdotes that end with
| "and everyone burst into applause" the whole way up into
| being world king (why not, it's your daydream!)
|
| So playing out scenarios in your head, essentially. Might
| sound harmless - there is no question of confusing these
| daydreams with reality - but you can find yourself retreating
| into the same ones again and again in a loop, especially when
| triggered by alcohol or music. I could put on my favourite
| songs and fantasize literally for hours, replaying the
| emotions. Endlessly scratching an endless itch. Obviously
| this might not be conducive with a productive life! I guess
| it would serve one well in solitary confinement.
|
| I used to think everyone was like this, but it seems quite
| rare. I don't seem to have a bad case of it, I certainly
| wouldn't dream of trying to medicate it. But it does make me
| feel bad about myself sometimes when I overdo it.
|
| Here's an article on it that may clarify more:
| https://www.theguardian.com/science/2022/aug/28/i-just-go-
| in...
| Mezzie wrote:
| Mine are complete fantasy and take place in other worlds +
| don't involve me at all. A lot of my daydreams are
| worldbuilding or exploring 'interesting' scenarios/situations
| that characters would end up in. Not really a good way to
| turn those into real life goals.
|
| I have a really shitty internal sense of self, though.
| wobbly_bush wrote:
| If they don't involve you at all, perhaps you can convert
| it into a LitRPG novel - something like CivCEO [1]
|
| [1] https://www.amazon.com/CivCEO-Lit-Accidental-Champion-
| Book-e...
| scottyah wrote:
| You could become an author, and at least get paid to dwell
| in those worlds
| narag wrote:
| Or not. Tension is a key ingredient of fiction that
| people pays for. If you're imagining a world to flee from
| reality it could be very bland and unrealistic.
| wobbly_bush wrote:
| There is LitRPG genre in which tension is not as key an
| ingredient. Also, there can be consumers of the writeup
| who don't particularly "buy" a book - so the writeup
| doesn't have to follow a typical book structure.
| Mezzie wrote:
| I've actually gotten paid for fiction writing before! I'm
| a good writer, but I despise marketing/branding and also
| really dislike doing creative work on a deadline/for a
| living. (It's the same reason I'm not a SWE actually
| because programming is a creative task for me.)
| soulofmischief wrote:
| This perspective fails to appropriately recognize ADHD and
| related phenomena as executive function disorders. Depression,
| shame, regret, and stress are actually _highly_ correlated with
| ADHD, OCD etc., because this exact executive function disorder
| often leads to the sufferer having a less than ideal life.
|
| And so it is akin to telling a person who suffers from real,
| clinical depression, to "just not be depressed". It's
| tautological advice.
|
| As for the nature of these daydreams; Understand that it's a
| general condition. The author's daydreams are likely all over
| the place, everything at once. My own rapidly change just like
| a real dream, from happy to sad over and over.
|
| It's not like the author is fixated on buying some dream car or
| living in a big house. There is an element of compulsive
| fixation on general daydreaming which can be extremely hard to
| overcome whenever it is caused by actual disorders in brain
| structure. For example, ADHD is characterized by a number of
| gene mutations which lead to reduced number of dopamine
| receptors throughout the brain. [0]
|
| There is no psychological way to just "get over" this. What
| needs to happen is society needs to accept that these are real
| disabilities and it can be just as rude telling someone who has
| an extreme case "don't dream it, be it," as it is to tell
| someone with general intellectual disabilities to just "study
| harder". Then maybe we can stop leaving otherwise very
| intelligent individuals behind to suffer in lifelong economic
| and psychological disparity.
|
| [0] https://www.omim.org/entry/143465
| lazide wrote:
| If the ADHD symptoms are caused by real, ongoing abuse by
| someone with say NPD - treating it as an executive function
| disorder will leave them stuck in a terrible situation,
| albeit with slightly less dysfunction.
|
| I've seen people get more functional - then be immediately
| attacked by said NPD person (indirectly) through gaslighting
| and sabotage, which of course put them back where they were.
| 'The meds stopped working'.
|
| Or maybe it was the meds stopped working - except for what I
| saw going on, at least.
| soulofmischief wrote:
| Good point. Severe stress and depression can cause a number
| of symptoms normally presented by ADHD, OCD, etc. While I
| was young my severe depression and stress came from living
| in an abusive household under an ex-boxer Catholic deacon
| and his narcissistic, control-freak wife.
|
| Always told myself things would get better once I got out
| of the situation; instead I found out the worst symptoms of
| my mental disorders were simply being masked by external
| factors.
|
| I recently broke down for an entire day after a judgemental
| encounter with someone, and learned about Rejection
| Sensitive Dysphoria, that I have had it for my entire life
| and that almost all ADHD sufferers experience it at least
| once. Just learning about it really helped change my
| perspective and gave me a way to move forward.
|
| Having had multiple run-ins with narcissists over the
| years, including my mom, I've had a habit of letting myself
| get harmed and being trapped by guilt or some misplaced
| loyalty. Now I know the (at least in part) the source of
| this habit and can change it.
|
| https://www.additudemag.com/rejection-sensitive-dysphoria-
| an...
| lazide wrote:
| Not sure if this is related, but interestingly enough
| too, I'm wondering if RSD is actually a PTSD trauma
| reaction triggered by the rejection.
|
| If someone was neglected or attacked by a caregiver when
| they approached them for help, especially if it was
| infrequent, and repeatedly told they weren't allowed to
| feel bad about it/it wasn't happening/if it was happening
| it was all their fault, and suffered significant distress
| because of it - how else would it present?
|
| Especially if it was at an age where they couldn't
| process or verbalize what was going on, and the parent
| was one they couldn't reject themselves (because they
| needed them or they'd be orphans or whatever).
|
| If RSD is really due to emotional neglect/rejection based
| Complex PTSD underlying the whole thing. It would make a
| _lot_ of sense.
| iamdbtoo wrote:
| This is a fascinating discussion. I have ADHD and have
| experienced RSD to an extreme level my whole life. I
| think the RSD has been more deblilitating than the ADHD,
| honestly. Up 'til now I just figured I was particularly
| sensitive, but hadn't considered it was amplified/caused
| by my emotionally neglectful mother.
|
| That would definitely make a lot of sense.
| soulofmischief wrote:
| One of the worst things about emotional neglect is it's a
| positive feedback mechanism.
|
| You are never taught how to properly tend to the emotions
| of both yourself and others, so unless you pair with an
| emotionally well-adjusted partner, you will lack the
| emotional knowledge required to teach your children
| better. And what's worse, your brain will relapse into
| the habits it _does_ have experience, which may often be
| negative.
| soulofmischief wrote:
| Hmm. I experienced this. As a child, I chewed on my
| shirt. No one could figure out why. From kindergarten to
| maybe 4th grade, it was a problem. My guardians' response
| was to collude with the school administrations and
| instruct teachers to call me out in class and belittle me
| if they saw me chewing on my shirt, and to send me to the
| principal's office. Then I would get beaten/punished at
| home. This happened with regularity. A lot of shame and
| punishment.
|
| At the time, I had undiagnosed OCD. And, it turns out,
| the medicine which I was being given against my will for
| an ADHD diagnosis I received at age 5, was causing me to
| experience dry mouth, which made me instinctually suck on
| the buttons and corners of my shirt. Mystery solved. But
| two therapists and years of punishment didn't figure that
| out. I did, in my adulthood.
|
| I had the same experience with uncontrollable, hour-long
| bouts of laughter which would end in vomiting and extreme
| stomach pain. Punished for them, told I was just trying
| to get attention. Turns out that was an expression of
| OCD. And dozens of other things not worth mentioning. The
| older I got, the more I came to appreciate the level of
| misunderstandings about my issues which led to even more
| violence inflicted upon me.
|
| So that is a possible avenue of explanation for why RSD
| and ADHD seem to be correlated. After speaking with some
| friends who have borderline disorder (I don't have this,
| but I do have bipolar disorder type II) it seems to be
| something they have experienced as well. And a great deal
| of BPD cases involve trauma.
|
| There is little doubt that something chemical _is_ taking
| place given that specific gene mutations seem to cause
| these disorders, or at least predispositions to them. I
| 'm sure that there is a correlation between RSD and the
| dopamine reuptake issues which characterize ADHD. But the
| feedback systems in nature vs nurture mean that these
| disorders can cause problems which themselves exacerbate
| the disorders or cause new symptoms to present.
| roadrunna wrote:
| > I recently broke down for an entire day after a
| judgemental encounter with someone, and learned about
| Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria
|
| Highly recommend to be radically honest and natural about
| everything. Every time you get a piece of info about
| yourself aka natural feedback will immediately enlighten
| you and help you expand your perspective and move
| forward.
|
| It's a bit counter-intuitive because so many of us are
| taught to hold thoughts, words and actions back, but once
| I stopped doing that, things started to improve
| massively.
|
| I watched non-ADHD people attempt the same but none of
| them evolved (my sample is small, 40+ people, I don't
| have notes on all of them). So far, the only difference I
| could find, was ADHD-pattern-recognition + that weird
| ADHD-Naivite <3
| lazide wrote:
| Be very careful with this around folks with Narcissistic
| Personality Disorder. Anything you say can and will be
| used against you to maximum destructive effect. Including
| them actively triggering the states that cause you to be
| confused and dysphoric.
|
| And they will often actively lie to you or manipulate you
| if they know you'll take what they say seriously and
| uncritically. There are many, many ways to do this.
|
| Many ADHD folks are people pleasers, and NPD folks will
| actively use those people's tendencies to destroy them
| and grin while doing it. I've seen it, it's deeply
| disturbing.
|
| Open and honest communication is great, with those
| capable of the same. Doing it with someone who is
| pathological is a recipe for disaster.
|
| It's possible to survive, but not until they've been fed
| through the meat grinder a few times and potentially
| after suffering more pain than you can possibly imagine.
| soulofmischief wrote:
| Sounds like you've been through the ringer yourself. I
| learned very early not to trust or be honest with
| authority figures.
|
| Linking the people-pleasing to RSD and thus ADHD recently
| was a massive eye-opener. And the connection between
| people-pleasing and cutting people off as two sides of
| the same emotional spectrum.
| stuckinhell wrote:
| This sounds like something happened to my deceased brother. He
| was a very very lonely person, and I'm pretty sure his daydreams
| were a coping mechanism.
|
| I wish I could have shaken him out of it.
| rg111 wrote:
| I had, and to some degree still have this daydreaming "problem".
| But it didn't really affect me in any significant way. Pomodoro
| helps while working/learning.
|
| Social Media was a much bigger problem for me. Which I got rid of
| after reading Deep Work.
|
| And I, from my childhood have had, what is often called
| "directional disorientation". Everyone who knows me considers me
| smart, I have achievements to demonstrate that. But, I can never
| remember how to navigate to an address. It takes me about 6-7
| times navigating via Google Maps before I can visit it without
| Maps.
|
| I am sometimes confused about some streets of my home town!
|
| I don't have problem focusing for longer times. I can work hard
| and learn quickly, but familiarity with physical spaces has
| always eluded me.
|
| Edit: Over the years, I have talked with at least half a dozen
| people on the internet who told me that they believe that they
| have this _thing_ , if it _is_ a _thing_.
| justinlloyd wrote:
| Google Maps and its ilk are like the contacts in your phone. If
| you teach your brain you don't need to remember that detail
| because you have a gadget to do it for you, you brain won't
| remember it. I have a pretty good mental map of the world
| around me, and can navigate pretty well, but the moment that a
| GPS navigation system gets involved, my brain shuts off and I
| don't remember how to get anywhere or where things are in
| relation to other things. I noticed this effect 25 years when I
| got my first in-car navigation system. I'm really good at
| recalling long sequences of numbers, six or seven credit cards
| and bank cards, including CV2 and expiry dates between my
| wife's wallet and my wallet, but the numbers in my contacts
| list on my phone, I don't remember any of those, my brain has
| learned it doesn't need to. I have observed the same effect in
| code navigation tools in IDEs for a quarter of a century,
| myself and other people forgetting the function they wrote just
| ten minutes ago. With the rise of chat GPTs I wonder how long
| we stop remembering details about documentation when there is
| an application that will just tell us what we need to know.
| There was even an Outer Limits episode about this very subject
| 30+ years ago.
| yasman wrote:
| The Jungians have much to say about daydreams. It is an active
| form on exploration on topics the subconscious is wrestling with.
| They have techniques to induce and explore daydreams in a
| directed way.
|
| "Inner Work" by Robert Johnson is a very approachable text. It
| focuses on using two technologies for personal growth: dream
| analysis and active imagination (basically day dreaming but you
| write it down and have a convo with your subconscious).
|
| He warns the imagination one if you really get into it can be all
| consuming. Reminds me of MD as this guy is going thru it.
|
| Might be worth talking to a Jungian therapist (or any therapist
| really). A Jungian might want to lean more onto the day dreaming
| to uncover a message if there is one as opposed to trying to
| "manage it".
|
| I daydreamed heavily when I was younger. A combination of
| isolation and ways to process hormones and unresolved trauma -
| what I discover many years later.
| richardjam73 wrote:
| Maybe instead it is a form of dissociation? Your mind just wants
| to go elsewhere to avoid something.
| Arisaka1 wrote:
| The first time I became aware of my tendencies to daydream was
| a very hard time of my childhood, and if it wouldn't for video
| games overstimulating me (which I don't consider them a good
| thing in excess, but I digress), I cannot even begin to imagine
| the things I would be doing to avoid pretty much everything
| back then.
| AnEro wrote:
| Yea I've been diagnosed with dissociation and its one of my
| methods so worth not writing off as a check-in. That said it
| can be either and both, isn't mental health fun :D
| Mezzie wrote:
| I have very, very severe maladaptive daydreaming and it is
| absolutely a form of disassociation for me. I was abused as a
| child by my parents and underserved by schools - there was no
| way out so I learned how to entertain myself doing nothing
| because anything I did would be 'wrong' and punished.
|
| As an adult it's pain coping - I have multiple sclerosis and of
| course I don't want to be present in my body: It HURTS here. I
| am also poor (see: disability) + in my 30s with no kids, so not
| much of a social life or benefit from being present.
|
| I spend most/all of my time at least somewhat disassociated.
| It's my default state.
| mrangle wrote:
| Masked ADHD? Just ADHD. There is no progression. Meds are
| unreliable. Moreover, my opinion is that this particular place on
| the spectrum is where ADHD and Asperger's meet. Stated
| differently, the puzzle of ADHD-PI may be that it is instead a
| symptom of (sometimes very high functioning) autism.
| siva7 wrote:
| That's not where the actual scientific research about
| Maladaptive Daydreaming is hinting at. It's not just ADHD, it
| checks also many marks with a PTSD or Dissociation but is still
| unique with its other characteristics.
| mrangle wrote:
| The "actual scientific research" will be most abundant and
| reliable for ADHD being correlated with this symptom. In
| fact, ADHD is frequently diagnosed using only this symptom
| along with any quantity of unavoidable life inhibiting
| factors that proceed from it.
|
| You'd find it an impossible feat to put together an adult
| subject group that excludes the PTSD variable, or a child
| group that includes it. Psychologists will find it impossible
| to use PTSD in differential diagnosis, given its frequency
| for ADHD (and autistic) individuals.
| hu3 wrote:
| Obligatory material about daydreaming by a psychiatrist:
|
| - Why Day Dreams Get In Your Way (33 minutes):
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Gw6gLBPvA8
|
| - Your Constant Daydreaming Can Be Hurting Your Mental Health (42
| minutes): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YUSi9tzdNiE
| weinzierl wrote:
| When I was at my first bigger class reunion we visited our old
| school. Most things had changed - schools are more living
| creatures than buildings apparently.
|
| I sat down at my old place in the classroom and looked out the
| window. When I saw the old tree in front of it, it immediately
| struck me:
|
| How many hours must I have spent watching this tree and while
| dreaming away utterly bored by what was happening around me.
| qez2 wrote:
| What I experience is different and less extreme than the author.
| But I learned, just now, that I have a mental condition. It even
| has it's own name, and it's not just a variant of ADD.
|
| Or at least I did. My symptoms lessened gradually over the years
| as I got older. I had it much less at 22 years old compared to 12
| years old.
|
| But I wouldn't have it differently. My mind wandering is (or was)
| the most important thing about me, and constitute who I am. I
| wouldn't want to become a different person. Then again, it
| doesn't take me an hour to change clothes.
| eyelidlessness wrote:
| > Does this sound like masked ADHD? I asked myself the same
| question. However, after cycling through numerous ADHD treatment
| protocols - from extensive therapies to high-dosage medications -
| my cognitive acuity remained unaltered, and there was no tangible
| progression. It felt akin to executing null operations in a code.
|
| > Interestingly, the MD paradox points towards an unintended
| consequence of ADHD treatment - it could potentially amplify
| daydreaming, a peculiar side-effect I noticed while medicated
| with methylphenidate. In essence, ADHD medication might
| turbocharge MD.
|
| This isn't a paradox, and it doesn't necessarily rule out ADHD as
| an underlying cause/exacerbating factor. Hyperfocus is a common
| ADHD symptom; said hyperfocus can be fixated on just about
| anything, yes even daydreaming; stimulants used to treat ADHD
| symptoms like _lack of focus_ can reinforce unwanted hyperfocus,
| it's an unfortunate side effect.
| lazide wrote:
| Yup. If there is an actual, real threat that someone is facing
| that they have reason to believe they'll have a legitimately
| bad time trying to address, it's not only a legitimate response
| to avoid it, but requires active delusions to prevent seeing
| it.
|
| Which, interestingly, ADHD meds can help do.
|
| Near as I can tell, ADHD symptoms have an absurd amount of
| overlap with Complex PTSD [https://www.nhs.uk/mental-
| health/conditions/post-traumatic-s...], especially when the
| complex PTSD was caused by repeated childhood exposure to
| someone with Narcissitic Personality Disorder that wouldn't let
| them see the source/cause of the actual problems causing them
| their pain.
|
| Additionally, narcissistic abuse produces symptoms which are
| VERY similar to what adult ADHD folks present with.
| [https://www.charliehealth.com/post/the-long-term-effects-
| of-...]
| Mezzie wrote:
| I would say the main difference between ADHD and CPTSD is
| that those of us with CPTSD can eventually 'rewire' our
| brains and act more 'normally'.
| lazide wrote:
| Interestingly, there really may not be much difference
| there either.
|
| Almost all of those diagnosed with ADHD/ADD do indeed still
| have the brain structure differences forever.
|
| However, almost all adults get better (as in no longer have
| clinically significant symptoms). They rewire. They still
| experience some of what is going on, but they've found ways
| to cope, or environments that fit them better, or have
| learned things that let them avoid the issues,
|
| Which is, basically what we're talking about CPTSD wise,
| no?
|
| [https://chadd.org/adhd-weekly/grow-out-of-adhd-not-
| likely/].
|
| I think that you're saying and what it is saying are
| equivalent in both cases (without much squinting required),
| just using different terms for the same real-world
| situations.
|
| I'm also wondering if it's also possible that the three
| sub-types of ADHD are attachment style related due to the
| ways of coping.
|
| Inattentive being avoidant, Hyperactive being anxious, and
| Combined type being disorganized (a mix of the two with no
| particular balance/with confusion - which would happen when
| there was no consistent pattern of avoidance or over-
| attention that worked).
| rumblerock wrote:
| Since I was diagnosed with ADHD last year I've been looking
| for other lenses to understand my own complex outside of a
| strictly genetic component. Self therapy, although I could
| probably use an actual therapist as well.
|
| Between developmental theories of ADHD, complex PTSD, and
| even going back to old foundational texts (Karen Horney's
| Neurosis and Human Growth from 1950 was great) - I've found a
| lot of alignment on the theories of childhood abuse and
| neglect that lead to developmental disorders, in my case ADHD
| and depression.
|
| As a child you have no basis for understanding what's wrong,
| or that the pain you feel is unusual. It's been a lot to
| process, and I'm not sure what to do with it yet, but at the
| very least it helps alleviate the weight of my rocky
| adulthood being "all my fault".
| mkaic wrote:
| I got diagnosed a year ago after not knowing I had it my whole
| life, and I can definitely confirm this. I take Adderall, and
| the way I describe it to people is that while it definitely
| helps me _focus_ , it doesn't make it any easier for me to
| choose _what I focus on_. So heck yeah, sometimes it 's super
| useful and helps me stay on task at work! Other times, I spend
| 5 hours diving extremely deep into research papers from fields
| I have no experience in and end up learning a ton of really
| cool stuff that is not at all relevant to my day job
| whatsoever. I have not yet figured out a way to control which
| scenario occurs on any given day.
| naasking wrote:
| > I have not yet figured out a way to control which scenario
| occurs on any given day.
|
| One tip I heard that seems to work pretty consistently: leave
| some work unfinished at the end of the day. Whatever you're
| working on at the end of the day, leave the last one or two
| tasks _almost_ finished, as in, leave only a few minutes of
| work left. Say writing some comments to document code,
| writing a detailed commit message of what you 're working on,
| maybe renaming the functions or variables to something more
| meaningful before you commit, etc.
|
| The next day you can easily convince yourself, "well I might
| as well take a minute or two to finish off these one or two
| trivial things", and now you're in "focused on work" mode and
| that's often enough momentum to keep going.
| scyzoryk_xyz wrote:
| This sounds like a chunk of what I experience on a regular basis,
| used to be more intense (now in my 30's).
|
| I know many creatives/artists who harness such traits to their
| advantage. I suspect more people experience reality like this
| than would openly admit. This is what I understand as "privacy"
| in my own way.
|
| ADHD was my diagnosis, what I learned is that for everyone with
| the disorder a completely different set of traits manifest
| themselves. Different experiences lead to different coping
| strategies, which in turn develop different personalities and
| values depending on the experiences with
| success/failures/traumas. Because of this treatments vary. For
| some it's medication, for others it's something else. Treatment
| is a big word too - what if along with the things you don't like
| there are parts that make you who you are. You don't want
| "treatment" to kill those off.
| lazide wrote:
| If part of who you are is in direct response to significant and
| ongoing unresolved trauma (by whatever source), if resolving
| that might result in that part ending up 'killed off' - or at
| least changed - no?
|
| Hypervigilance, at least?
|
| If nothing changes, nothing will change.
| kayodelycaon wrote:
| I've actually experienced this. I was diagnosed bipolar after
| a rather severe psychotic break. Up to that point I had
| defined my life as being a terrible person striving to become
| better.
|
| Medication very quickly showed me I was not a terrible
| person, but that I was suffering severely from mania and even
| more dangerous paranoia.
|
| As I stabilized, everything that defined me was stripped
| away, leaving an empty husk. I very quickly realized as
| traumatic at this was, it was a start to healing and an
| enormous opportunity. During that process, I got to choose
| who I would become.
|
| Now, a few years later, I'm happy with who I am and plan to
| keep improving. Medication has allowed me to sit down and
| focus on creative things instead of being overwhelmed and
| scared all the time.
| scyzoryk_xyz wrote:
| Not sure I catch your meaning there, but agree, I guess?
|
| Where is the threshold of significance for the trauma is the
| question. And it's a philosophical one, really. Individual.
|
| If something needs to change then yeah, have to work on that
| one. I don't know about being "hyper vigilant" though - that
| doesn't sound like a good life to be living.
| lazide wrote:
| If someone is in a state of pain, unwillingness to change
| their circumstances or their responses to circumstances
| will stop them from leaving that state of pain. It's hard
| to not call our personalities 'responses to circumstances'
| to some level.
|
| There is no objective measure for 'serious' or not trauma,
| near as I can tell. It's usually subjective measures like
| pain scales, or subjective judgements like level of
| dysfunction in daily life.
|
| A veteran who physically attacks anyone wearing a uniform
| is a pretty easy diagnosis, compared to say an outwardly
| successful executive who has managed to hide his severe
| alcoholism. Both have issues.
|
| Hypervigilance can also be known as 'noticing things others
| don't', 'being exceptionally very aware of others needs',
| 'being able to read people's minds', 'seeing it coming
| before anyone else', etc.
|
| It's adaptive when the environment has unpredictable and
| real threats. A soldier in a war zone who notices that twig
| snap in the background and wakes up is adaptively hyper
| vigilant. It can (and often does) keep him alive.
|
| A leader (or follower) who notices their boss is going
| insane before it's too late to get away, or that one of
| their folks is acting weird before they can betray the
| group? Similar.
|
| The programmer who can't get to sleep because they're
| constantly trying to figure out why they think something is
| going wrong is maladaptively hyper vigilant.
|
| But that could be because they aren't being allowed to see
| what is wrong, not because there is nothing wrong. Or maybe
| it is because they're overused to solving problems, and
| lack of a problem to solve is concerning.
|
| It's the state of always noticing what is going on around
| you and who is doing what, and frankly hyperfocus could be
| a part of it too.
|
| That's turning all that energy into what has been
| identified as the actual problem/threat (at the moment).
| Think tunnel vision.
|
| Focus is nothing if not 'removing undesired/confusing data
| from the picture' after all.
|
| Trauma reactions tend to be things like Hypervigilance, or
| complete tuning out/dissociation, or hyper aggressiveness
| (always fighting everything, even when it makes no sense),
| or extreme manipulation (as the threat was someone who
| could not be directly fought/won against). Each of these
| have corresponding disorders on various axis, though they
| aren't called out as such near as I can tell.
| [deleted]
| vsareto wrote:
| This regularly happened to me in adulthood, but Vyvanse cleared
| it up for me (for as long as it's active).
| SteveDR wrote:
| My tool for this kind of problem in my own life has been writing
| lyrics / poetry. Poetry is nice because you don't need to close
| any loops or structure a beginning, middle, and end. You just
| drop in, spit up some words that convey the core thought, and
| leave.
| vishkk wrote:
| a little romanticizing:
|
| "Just as some people work because they're bored, I sometimes
| write because I have nothing to say. Daydreaming, which occurs
| naturally to people when they're not thinking, in me takes
| written form, for I know how to dream in prose. And there are
| many sincere feelings and much genuine emotion that I extract
| from not feeling"
|
| - Fernando Pessoa
|
| "I hesitate in everything, often without knowing why. How often
| I've sought - as my own version of the straight line, seeing it
| in my mind as the ideal straight line - the longest distance
| between two points. I've never had a knack for the active life.
| I've always taken wrong steps that no one else takes; I've always
| had to make an effort to do what comes naturally to other people.
| I've always wanted to achieve what others have achieved almost
| without wanting it. Between me and life there were always sheets
| of frosted glass that I couldn't tell were there by sight or by
| touch; I didn't live that life or that dimension. I was the
| daydream of what I wanted to be, and my dreaming began in my
| will: my goals were always the first fiction of what I never
| was."
|
| Fernando Pessoa
| [deleted]
| atomicnature wrote:
| Pessoa, as good as that lao from the tao, maybe better;
| effortless movement, eternal relevance (or something dreamy and
| awesome like that).
| vishkk wrote:
| Absolutely! Hoping that more and more people read him!
| jwx48 wrote:
| Whoa, this takes me back to 2nd grade when I did almost nothing
| but daydream during class. My daydreams were elaborate science
| fiction. I got in a lot of trouble for it, both with my parents
| and the (substitute) teacher. The teacher ended up paddling me
| for doing it, which was a terrible punishment for being so far
| ahead of my peers[0] that I had to find a way to compensate.
|
| --- [0] I need to be very specific here: I do _not_ think I was
| smarter than my classmates, or some special genius. I had just
| been afforded more of an educational foundation by that point in
| time.
| capableweb wrote:
| Did you by any chance went by the name of Spiff in your
| daydreams? :) Sounds familiar...
| jwx48 wrote:
| Lol. I loved Calvin and Hobbes for many reasons, but one of
| them was definitely because I could relate. I need to read
| them again...
| mkaic wrote:
| I come back to Calvin and Hobbes regularly as an adult and
| every time I do I'm reminded just how delightful
| Watterson's work is. Truly a one-of-a-kind comic strip.
| brachika wrote:
| I never experienced the level of immersiveness of the author, but
| I did daydream quite a lot all the way into my early 20s. I would
| completely ignore my professors during my classes, I would talk
| with myself when I walked home, I would dissociate myself from
| reality imagining all kinds of different scenarios.
|
| How I solved this? Well, not by myself. One of the topics of my
| daydreams was this girl that I was infatuated with. Long story
| short, we somehow get together, I realize that our relationship
| wasn't exactly going on the way I imagined it, we break up, I go
| through quite a depressive, suicidal period, I lose most of my
| friends. Completely unrelated, two years after I had to do a
| surgery which kinda grounded me more into reality. Since then, I
| rarely daydream, it is like my imaginary world was shattered by
| this moment. It is like I finally 'grew'.
| rambambram wrote:
| > One of the topics of my daydreams was this girl that I was
| infatuated with.
|
| Sounds familiar. Any chance she was of the cluster b type?
| noodles_nomore wrote:
| Please explain how you made this connection.
| rambambram wrote:
| The word "infatuation" says enough, especially if we're
| talking (young) adults, and not the kind of puppy love we
| expect from teenagers. If you're an adult and you feel
| infatuated, you might mistake that for love, then check if
| you're dealing with a narcissist or other cluster B
| disordered person, and also see if you yourself are an
| empath or highly empathetic.
| balfirevic wrote:
| > and also see if you yourself are an empath
|
| How do I see this, is there a test or something like
| that?
| rambambram wrote:
| I found the Youtube videos from dr. Abdul Saad of Vital
| Mind Coaching very insightful.
| brachika wrote:
| Oh yeah. Extremely narcissistic, controlling, 'better than
| you' type of person. Used to let me recover for a couple of
| weeks then stomped me again. That whole experience completely
| destroyed my daydreaming experience because in my imagination
| everything was rosy with unicorns, when it was toxic as hell
| in real life.
| rambambram wrote:
| Especially with empaths, they can sort of take over your
| mind for a while. I had the same experience in the past,
| although it was definitely distinguishable from the
| daydreaming I knew, which was more often just activated
| because of boredom at school or as a "passive pastime" in
| the train.
| konaraddi wrote:
| I hope OP checks out "Yes, you can cure Maladaptive Daydreaming"
| - https://wildminds.ning.com/m/discussion?id=4661400%3ATopic%3...
|
| Some things that have helped a close friend get in the groove of
| staying present and reduce the frequency and duration of
| daydreaming: trying to meditate, focusing on the breath to stay
| present, making an effort to notice when they're daydreaming and
| _politely_ telling themselves things to the effect of "come back,
| the real world is here, not there", and actively pursuing
| something interesting (because it's hard to say no to an
| addiction unless there's an engaging substitute).
| siva7 wrote:
| I don't think so. It's a bit like saying "Yes, you can cure
| depression by being more positive". The environment is crucial
| for a better outcome, even having a somewhat stable life, but
| that's far from a cure.
| petercooper wrote:
| Maybe it's not the same but I daydream quite deeply when I'm
| doing things that have no verbal component. So like when I'm
| driving, I'll start planning stuff out and coming up with ideas
| (often quite visually, too) then "snap" back and think.. I don't
| remember any of the actual driving. It's common enough to have a
| name though - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Highway_hypnosis -
| and I haven't had any accidents. Curiously, putting on talk radio
| or podcasts helps as it prevents the daydreaming.
| luminen wrote:
| I've experienced the same with routine tasks such as showering
| or going for a run. I'll often put on a podcast or audiobook,
| but if I don't find myself actively focusing on the narrative,
| the daydream will be "louder" than what I'm listening to. I
| find I can go almost an hour with background noise I never
| heard before realizing I completely lost my place.
|
| This phenomenon does not occur if I'm reading a physical piece
| of media, like a book.
| stefncb wrote:
| I do it with books, too. If I'm not 100% interested in what
| I'm reading there's a very good chance I'll doze off into an
| elaborate daydream.
|
| I also emphasize with the "louder" thing. Uninteresting
| things aren't as loud as my thoughts so I have to make an
| effort to suppress them.
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