Letting Go of a Fantasy World that I Developed to Escape Childhood Abuse.
I know at some point in the past year I have blogged about my maladaptive daydreaming...
But I didn't quite explain the connection between when it started and my abuse. This is because I hadn't even connected it myself. I recently have been able to completely stop the maladaptive daydreaming after realizing it was escapism. It was a coping mechanism that while once necessary was only a crutch in my adulthood and was holding my back. I was clinging onto a security blanket that was no longer needed.
How I escaped a dark reality by creating a new reality in my own head.
When I first started my maladaptive daydreaming it was based on my obsession at the time. The-X-Files. In my imagination, usually played out for hours and hours before falling asleep, I was Scully and my intense friendship with Mulder sustained me. In reality, I was being abused sexually and was unable to get help for it after trying to go to adults. So, I simply looked for comfort and safety inside myself. In the form of maladaptive daydreaming. A term I only learned about a few years ago.
I would spend many hours in the reality and I remember feeling safe and loved. Often falling asleep holding myself tightly but imagining it was someone else. A protector. Probably Mulder. I didn't think of how sad it was at the time. But looking back at that abused child who couldn't find help in real life and imagining her holding herself and pretending to be safe inside her head makes me feel...gosh, something. I don't even know what. I guess sadness. Or, really protectiveness. Which is why I am working on healing my inner child now.
The evolution of my fantasy world.
As I grew older my secret world became less focused on fictional characters. I was always playing myself although I was the best version of myself. I was stronger, smarter, braver, and I had achieved my goals in life. I had elaborate stories play out and even had love interests. -Boy, it is going to be embarrassing to post this one- I had pretty intense romances to be honest. Ones that no real life romance could hold a candle to due to the fact that it wouldn't be a fantasy. In real life, you have two humans (or more) with complex emotions and desires. That sort of relationship will never be the thing of my fantasies. Fantasies that brought my to tears. I worked out a lot of issues through maladaptive daydreaming. For awhile my fantasies were dark and focused on domestic violence, intense love affairs, and sometimes homicide or suicide.
I felt embarrassed of this double life I was leading. I didn't talk about it and I didn't want to think about it even. I ended up seeking out thrills like the ones in my fantasies in real life. Going after intense, unrealistic love affairs with highly damaged individuals. It was disastrous, terrifying, but certainly thrilling and I would continue this adrenaline seeking habit until one explosive night when I got in too deep with someone too dangerous.
Letting go of the comfort of an alternate reality.
I think that was the beginning of the end of my dream world. I realized how it was only pulling me away from making real connections and also causing me to seek the same sort of thrills in reality. It was becoming distracting at best and dangerous at worst. While there is nothing wrong with day dreaming when you want desperately to get away from real people so you can lay in your room muttering to yourself and "hanging out" with figments of your imagination something is wrong and this was the case for me. I felt like living my actual life was an annoying chore that was keeping me from living in my improved reality.
I always said I would be screwed if I had access to a holodeck because my desire to escape reality has been strong since I was just a child. Though, I only within the past few months have started analyzing when and why this behavior started. It now seems so obvious I was trying to escape me abuse in the only way I knew how but that isn't something I was willing to admit just last year when I was still desperately trying to latch onto my fantasy. Sometimes, I would find myself thinking "You are in your room talking to yourself...nobody is here" and I would be pulled out of this realm and feel really...ashamed and silly. This is when I knew I was outgrowing my vice.
Clearly I still value imagination and even fantasy. I probably still daydream more than the average bear but I now channel this into creative energy. Harnessing it in a healthy way to create visual art and stories. I no longer try to escape reality to enjoy this other world. I simply merge fantasy with my reality to enrich the world I am living in and share it with actual living, breathing humans.
Wow, a very powerful post. 💕 I commend such bravery and strength but am sorry you had to deal with such awful demons.
I am happy you were able to better yourself from this and further channel your imagination into such creative energy. I love your writing and am an avid follower of yours 😊
Aw thank you. I am glad it reached someone who it touched. It was actually scary posting it but I think it is important to be honest with the lengths I had to go to in order to cope with such a harsh reality in case any abuse survivors stumble on my blog. It was a long, dark, complicated road and I am still not all the way to being healthy and happy so I want to be honest about that.
I am also glad to hear you are an avid follower. I just followed you back. :)
@lauralemons, I was also sexually abused as a child and used similar coping mechanisms. Thank you for sharing your experiences.
You are very strong.
Have you seen this, on a similar topic: http://www.cracked.com/quick-fixes/why-hogwarts-was-all-in-harrys-head-conspiracy-theory/
Here I am, talking about my own experience of being abused, and how I healed the wounds:
Thank you for speaking out.