I Have Maladaptive Daydreaming. I've Actually Spent Hours And Hours Every Day Doing Nothing But Daydreaming. I Will Weave Complex Daydream Scenarios That I "Star" In. This Problem Is Listed On Wikipedia. Anyone Else Have It?

I started doing this when I was about 8 or 9 years old.  I would lie away at night and weave these complex night-day dreams and I was always the star.  When I was about 10 I was sitting in a chair and listening to music and started rocking in the chair and day dreaming.  I found that the louder the music and the faster the beat I was able to enhance my daydream.  I somehow eventually moved to the floor and always rocked and daydreamed to music.  It consumed me.  I was in a trance.  I would rock so hard and fast that I would break into a sweat.  I did this until I was in my 40's and finally said no more.  It was hard to break away from it.  I still have a hard time concentrating but I don't have the elaborate dream world or stage production that I am starring in.  However, sometimes, if I have an event coming up and lets say I am entertaining - I catch myself creating a dream of lets say - I prepare an incredible meal and imagine all of the inner workings and how people will interact with me.  It never turns out the way I imagined, so I try hard to live in the moment.  This problem, I was so ashamed of took so much of my life - I believe that I felt very inferior and am extremely sensitive.  I never thought I could do the things I wanted to but could do them better than anyone in my day dream.  I had to slow myself down - calm myself - reassure myself that I was allright and take small steps to get ahead.  You can over come this - I never got help and was too embarrassed to come forward - but now there is lite for so many.  I never once thought that my day dream world was real - but if was a relief from the unhappy world that I seemed to have reality in.  I hope this helps someone.

I do the same thing! I come from a healthy family and when I was younger I was really into stuff like anime and video games (still am) and created imaginary friends until I was like 12. I'm 17 now, and even though I kicked the imaginary friend habit, I'll spend hours just walking around my house with my ipod in daydreaming about these stories I create in my head that would last forever. It only occurred to me just recently that maybe this isn't normal behavior. Most of the time its triggered by something I'm reading or watching and I'd have to get up and start pacing around my room thinking about it until I can settle down and continue with whatever I was doing. That was fine because it didn't really interfere with my school work or my social life, but I notice when I'm reading I'll just blank out without realizing it and I'll have to read the last few paragraphs over again. And when I talk, I forget what I'm saying sometimes because I'll get distracted and start imagining random stuff. I also noticed that I absolutely have to do this at least every few days in a place where I'm alone and its quiet. The only real downside to this is that I can't focus, which is really annoying, but other than that its great. I kinda don't want it to stop, even if it is unhealthy.

I am so excited to learn what I have been doing for years is called Maladaptive daydreaming. I always thought to be just a strange individual with a secret only my family knew of...hopefully. I, like many others, go into a trance, much like a dream world when I listen to music and pace back forth in my room for ridiculous amounts of time and really put off other responsibilities because I would rather be in my dream world where I am the center of attention and always doing everything amazingly. I finally decided to look for others who may do the same thing in an effort to finally discover what I was doing was called and if many others have the same daily lives. Luckily, unlike many from the posts I have read, my mother has always stayed at a distance and never tried to put me on medication or send me to a psychiatrist. I really think it would have only made matters worse. I do still have problems with school work, considering I have been doing this since I was about 8 or 9 and I am now 20 years old but I am in college with aspirations and dreams with a girlfriend and a limited social life, but a social life none other and coping with my addiction to the "dreamworld". Also, I have always felt embarrassed about my daydreaming world. I feel much better to now know that others daydream as I do as well and many have become successful from their ventures in their own "dreamworld". I love the Internet.  : )

I just also figured out I had this like so many of you. I can't believe how bad some of you make it seem, maybe its because you are depressed and the day dreaming with depression is a bad combination. The day dreaming definitely hurt my social life when I was younger, but I grew out of that and am sociable now, I feel like the day dreams make me a stronger person. I think of things nobody I know thinks of, things that have to do with work, school, etc, I get great ideas. I also been making a story since I was about 6 or 7 which is when I really started day dreaming (I'm 22 now)

Something I haven't heard anyone else mention though that I experience is that, while listening to music helps put me in a deep day dream, if I go into a day dream in the morning; or even listen to music and try not to go into a day dream, then I will go into a deep trance and I feel like I have very little awareness of my surroundings. At first I thought it was sleep drunkenness, I still kind of do, but I feel like it is somehow related to me day dreaming. Like day dreaming, or listening to music, makes it so I can't function at all in the morning.

I have this problem too. Narcissism is a big part of it. If not the entire root of it. For me at least. I always star in my fantasies as you guys have mentioned. It's worse than just harmless daydreaming.