Discovering Maladaptive Daydreaming

I don't quite remember how I discovered what I had was called Maladaptive Daydreaming. What I do remember is looking up fantasy and coping mechanisms in an outdated children's psychology book and somehow finding this page on Daydreaming Disorder. There is a lot of helpful information on it, including tips on stopping and a link to this study, Compulsive Fantasy: proposed evidence of an under-reported system through systematic study of 90 self-identified non-normative fantasizers.

Between that page and the study, I recognized a lot of my symptoms: daydreaming automatically or without planning to, pacing and making weird faces as I daydreamed.

In my daydreams, I am a character from a book or another sort of media, and I am usually a character that is part of a couple, be it of friends or people dating. The daydreams themselves are usually about one of the following:

• me having an argument with the other person in the couple
• me doing unexpected that changes that person's view at me
• me rescuing that person or becoming stronger

I guess a way that you could frame it is that I am role playing as that character. As in, I am thinking about their relationships and concerns and reacting to things based on what they value. I've also thought about it as living vicariously through that character.