MALADAPTIVE DAYDREAMING
A Memoir, a Madness, a Movement to be Recognised
By James C. Relton
By James C. Relton
Come in, take a seat, thank you for clicking through from a social media forum, or perhaps following a link shared by a friend, family member, colleague or even a clinician.
This is my personal journey, a memoir if you will.
Through most of my life I’ve battled with an affliction – my madness as I often refer to it.
I want to share my story – and I warn you, it’s not always an easy read – in the hope that it might help others who are dealing with the same.
Together we might join the movement to get this condition formally recognised by medical professionals the world over.
At the time of writing, I’m in my fifties. For forty years not a day has passed where I haven’t been affected by something that, as late as 2019, I could put a name to:
‘Maladaptive Daydreaming’ (MD)
A term coined by a psychologist called Dr. Eli Somer.
“An excessive and vivid fantasy activity that interferes with an individual’s normal functioning and can result in severe distress.”
I’m not a doctor, a physician, an academic or a health and wellbeing guru, but I guess I am a veteran of this condition, this mental illness.
So, for those who have and are battling with MD (you’re not alone) and for those who haven’t experienced MD, but who know and love an MD sufferer, I hope my story will be useful.
This is a warning from history, a ‘warts and all’ memoir, a window onto this illness before it had a label.
Thankfully there are options now: support mechanisms, and the stigma of mental illness is dissipating. I’ve signposted useful articles, videos, articles and forums in the ‘Useful Info‘ tab above.
MD has taken my life in directions that I have come to regret and others that I wouldn’t change for all the money on the planet.
This is a cautious tale, a living, breathing case study if you will, of where things could go wrong if MD starts to control you, or if you lose control.
Maladaptive Daydreaming has shaped me but won’t define me.
My story starts in the mid-1970s …
My earliest memories are still some of the happiest. Our house down ‘the Lanes’, toddling along the kitchen floor to reach the ‘demi-god’ as he arrived home from work, a giant in the doorway, aka my Dad.
The sound of Mum’s old agitator washing machine in the kitchen as I played nearby, her sprinkle of kisses on my tummy, feeling so secure.
And this wonderful little brother, a new playmate who never got a fair go on any new toy.
Even as a toddler, I must have daydreamed.
All kids daydream, especially small children; it’s a natural and normal part of life.
Knights, Superman, Star Wars, James Bond, Indiana Jones … this was around 1985, 1986, probably before half the people who set up these brilliant online forums were even born!
It was normal, I daydreamed, no issue, but as I grew up past 13, 14, 15 years of age, I realised this choice – and I guess it is a choice – started to greatly accelerate.
In a typical school in the UK, or most places around the world, even back in the 1980s, there was a lot going on, in school and after school.
Everything was offline, the first computers were being introduced, but this was a time before mobile [cell] phones, and smart phones were a thing of the future, we were more ‘Flintstones’ than ‘Jetsons’ (find them on YouTube), and there were only four channels on the television.
People met up in person, arranged meet ups by passing notes in class or chatting in the playground. Any normal kid would want to get involved in the many and varied events and activities.
You know, the getting to know people stuff – finding and making new friends at the ‘big’ school I’d just moved up to, maybe finding a group of friends, even better still perhaps, being part of a ‘gang’.
This is how it was meant to work, right?
Well, it turned out differently for me.
I did not have one single friend in secondary school, what many countries would call high school (note: I’m not crying about it, just stating the facts).
I hung out on the fringes of various groups (Goths in the making, bookworms, sporty types, cool kids and the beautiful ones, briefly). But I didn’t choose them, and they didn’t choose me. They weren’t really bothered about me; this hurt a little, but I wasn’t overly bothered either …
… because I found a better place to play.
I’d discovered the equivalent of virtual reality, without the need for the headset, and the graphics were far superior to the gaming realm.
I could transport myself to different places, I could be whoever I wanted to be, live out adventures, all from the ‘comfort’ of my own mind.
This was a superpower like no other. You might be asking “where did I go?”
“Come with me and you'll be
In a world of pure imagination
Take a look and you'll see
Into your imagination
We'll begin with a spin
Traveling in the world of my creation…”
– Gene Wilder, Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory, 1971 | Producer, Tom Mack –
Not surprisingly, my reverie was influenced by popular culture.
Today, as we’re surrounded by media at every turn, on our multiple devices, on billboards, shop windows, it’s everywhere. Beamed across the globe are images of the rich and famous: Taylor Swift, K-Pop, Game of Thrones, the latest fantasy Marvel or DC universes, or even politicians and social media celebrities, these might be your go to influences or influencers.
Back in my day, as a teenager, my daydreaming (slowly becoming more maladaptive) coincided with the introduction of large cinema complexes with huge screens and surround sound, springing up all over the UK.
With my dad’s hard-earned money, I was at the front of the cinema queue, in that period of the franchises (and toys) of George Lucas and Steven Spielberg.
The mind-altering movie franchise, for me, was James Bond, a British classic that has been sold across the globe. I can never forget my first 007 movie at the cinema, on the big screen. I had seen plenty of Sean Connery and Roger Moore ‘Bond’ movies on the small screen (television) at home at Christmas and bank holidays, and even on VHS (video tapes), but the cinema experience was so much different, it turned up the dial on my dreams.
Our early influences stay with us: our annual summer holiday to Anglesey in North Wales always included a trip to the local cinema (usually when the inevitable rain came pouring down). It was an ‘old school’ movie theatre, uncomfortable seats, sticky ‘popcorn’ floors, but a happy place. I can vividly remember watching Welshman Timothy Dalton in ‘The Living Daylights’ (1987) as he cemented himself as my favourite 007 of all time.
In my bedroom each night I would act out the fight scenes, the chase scenes, even the romantic scenes which often left me with teary eyes, physically and emotionally drained (but fulfilled) after I’d paced and jumped and dived around for two hours embodying film heroes of the silver screen.
By this point, my MD, or immersive daydreaming as it is sometimes referred to, was cruising along quite well, it was a buzz, a reward. I practiced in my spare time, not all day yet, mainly in the evening after dinner (or ‘tea’ as we call it in the North of England). My ability to disassociate from reality was slowly becoming more proficient.
The worlds I created in my mind, I could mentally become other characters, embroiled in complex storylines, I could be the hero, I could choose who won, who got ‘the girl’, who landed the punch on the bad guy … all the opposites of the ‘real outside’ world.
I enjoyed it, but what became clear later was …
it was all about not wanting to be me!
“If you behave like a regular guy, you get treated like a regular guy. You can't cut yourself off from the world.
You ultimately would go crazy, wouldn't you?”
– Timothy Dalton, actor who played James Bond –
As this ability to choose to dissociate became greater, two other huge influences came into my life, the legendary rock band ‘Queen’ (especially the drummer Roger Taylor, rather than the flamboyant frontman Freddie Mercury) and the art of English football goalkeeping (‘soccer’ for a global audience).
I don’t know why I chose these; I just loved them, and I focused on both like a laser beam, devouring every book/magazine/video I could find on both subjects, soaking up tons of information, and importantly detail. I’d be constantly tapping my fingers like they were drum sticks (I became the best air drummer on earth!) or playing goalkeeper at every opportunity.
Despite not being the tallest, I was brave, I’d go on to be a well-respected goalkeeper at school, local levels and even go onto coach at a high amateur level and as part of soccer schools in the United States. Goalkeeping became a badge of honour and gave me credibility at school. This would soon come in handy …
… because around this time, the bullying at school kicked in.
“Sticks and stones may break your bones,
but words will never hurt you”
This was a common phrase banded about when I was a kid; it was probably a phrase from a bygone era even then, and I hope it’s not used today.
It’s damaging, a short, sharp sentence that in one fell swoop, can both dismiss and be dismissive of psychological bullying, and emotional torment.
My bullying at school centred around one individual and his small cabal. Relentless verbal abuse, belittling words, sly looks, spreading of insidious rumours like “I was gay and away with one of the teachers”.
It was about power, social status (probably stemming from his own insecurities) and superiority.
“Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words can also hurt me.
Stones and sticks break only skin, while words are ghosts that haunt me.
Slant and curved the word-swords fall, it pierces and sticks inside me.
Bats and bricks may ache through bones, but words can mortify me.
Pain from words has left its scar, on mind and heart that's tender.
Cuts and bruises have not healed, it's words that I remember.”
– Ruby Redfort, written by children’s book author, Lauren Child –
There was limited physical abuse, my growing strength and fearlessness honed as a goalkeeper helped with that, I could hold my own. Fighting back against the psychological abuse was harder.
I’m reminded that I played Queen’s song ‘Save Me’ on repeat around this time, perhaps my cry for help, and I did tell my parents about the bullying. As my family reflect on this period today, they have speculated that perhaps being born premature or the acne medication I was prescribed (Roaccutane) might have contributed, but I’m not so sure.
The school became involved, but as the abuse wasn’t physical, it was difficult to prove. My aggressor was a snake-charmer (of the teachers) and as we were teenagers, I think the consensus from the adults was that ‘it would sort itself out’. It didn’t …
I withdrew; I became more introverted, more socially awkward, more isolated. As a result … you guessed it, my newfound power of disassociation accelerated to full speed, and I found it increasingly hard to put the brakes on.
“Loneliness becomes a lover, solitude a darling sin.”
– Ian Fleming, “The Spy Who Loved Me: James Bond 007” –
Daydreaming – now very much maladaptive – became my drug, my heroin; it was a safe place to go, and I took more and more opportunities to inject this into my life. My dreams became more and more complex, full of intricate detail, influenced by my interests and idols.
As an example, in my daydream I would inhabit my heroes, map out a complex day in their shoes, from dawn until dusk. Queen drummer Roger Taylor, was a ‘go to’ candidate …
“… awaking to a late lavish breakfast in the city’s best hotel, a shower and shave, some phone calls home, the drum ‘tech’ and bodyguard of many years knocking on the door, an interview or two, drive to soundcheck at the stadium (five minutes for Roger, fifty minutes for guitarist Brian May), then back to the carefully constructed safety of the specially constructed backstage tent, warm snacks on hand, line the stomach for after show drinks.
A chat with Mick Jagger who’d come to watch this one, a doze on one of the few sofas surrounded by sides of beers, vodka, whiskey, gently awakened by one of the band or security and friend Chris.
Into stage clothes, a little make-up, the sound building and building in Roger’s (or my) ear as the crowd started filling the 80,000+ capacity arena, the stage roadies finished safety checks, lights, cameras were all checked and checked again.
A yawn, a good stretch, a little hopping around, a few bounces of the drumsticks off a nearby sofa edge. Five-minute call from one of the crew. Some vocal warm-ups are done, the management personal assistants, dressers, light, sound, security guys all perspire slightly and tighten up.
The short walk to the stage, up the ramp, around to the right to crouch briefly behind the drumkit as the intro music played, then … ‘The Show’
… drumsticks down, roadies rush on, back to the tent for food, drinks, hotel, shower, plane or party”.
Ideally, a ‘paracosm’ (detailed imaginary world) like this might be broken into sections, but it had to be finished in that day, otherwise the adrenaline, endorphins and serotonin I had created a few minutes before, would be followed by a ‘downer’ of equal proportions. And pity the poor individual – often my younger brother – who disturbed me.
He was the proverbial ‘punch bag’ in other ways too. As the regular habit of abuse at school continued, I’d sometimes direct my frustrations out on him when at home. I deeply regret this; I should have been a better role model, but we’ve become closer again (and he’s helped greatly to tell my story). Sadly, it’s not uncommon, trauma begets trauma, breaking the cycle is what we strive for.
I would often try and fashion a way out of daily activities, so that I could take my MD drug and as I grew, my scope of reading, TV and film also grew, thus wider were my choices of topic to daydream about each day.
My talent to spot or create time to take my drug also increased – homework was a good one, escape to my room for an hour – I’d focus intensely on homework for twenty minutes, and that would buy me a forty minute ‘dreamy high’.
At one of my school parents’ evenings, one teacher told my Mum and Dad, that I was an ‘enigma’, which means ‘a person or thing that is mysterious or difficult to understand’. I guess they were onto something, but they hadn’t even scratched the surface!
I didn’t wake up with an actual daydreaming plan, but it wasn’t long after breakfast that I’d chosen 3 or 4 favourites depending on how much downtime I thought I’d get that day: one for soccer, one for a film I’d seen recently, one for music and always one for the plain clothes detectives that fascinated me.
Day-to-day life did go on; I sometimes couldn’t (or wouldn’t) daydream because I might be ill, have an important exam to revise for, or my attention might be drawn to concerns about the health of a close relative.
My MD repertoire evolved. I got better, I mastered daydreams of 2 min, 4 min, 6 min – mini daydreams where my heroes performed more mundane tasks such as Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes – shaving, washing, dressing – before he and Dr Watson hailed a two-person hansom cab and headed out into the misty and dim lit streets of London. Perhaps I was drawn to Sir Arthur Conan Doyles lavish detailed writing which helped paint the pictures in my mind, and that his character Sherlock had his own addiction (to morphine).
Often, I would do twenty of these small daydreams in a day. Only at night would I get a chance for anything much longer.
It was an addiction; I hated myself for it as much as I hated someone saying, “excuse me” and disturbing my intravenous line to my daydreaming fix.
But one thing remained constant …
IT WAS ALL ABOUT NOT BEING ME!
So, who am I?
My daydreams remained a place of solace, a realm of comfort and safety when my reality was the polar opposite, at best uncomfortable and at worst traumatising.
The bullying at school was a constant, but worse was to come, the details of which I would rather avoid. I was sexually abused at the age of fifteen by a ‘teammate’ in the five-a-side soccer team I played in. It’s a shame I’ve carried through life and only shared with a few people; I’m nervous about sharing it on this platform.
But this is my memoir, for good or for ill, it’s part of my story and I ask that if you are reading this, and you’ve experienced similar, do reach out to someone, don’t carry the burden and the shame like I did.
In the following years, I had yet more bullies, this time at my local sports centre, where I visited and then worked. They would both treat me like dirt, making ‘homosexual’ jokes, strange jokes, ‘don’t go near him’ jokes. I was seventeen, they were both a few years older. They were bigger and stronger, so any physical retort would have been near pointless, and for some reason, despite the abuse, I looked up to them, even idolised them in twisted sort of way.
I’m not sure why I was targeted. I wasn’t a bad looking lad, perhaps this had something to do with why they directed their vitriol at me. My saving grace was a real friend – in the real world – a man who was taken from us too soon (at the age of 32). We connected, he thought I was hilarious, he took me under his wing, into his wolf pack. Without the security of this guy (and he was a handsome muscular fighting machine to boot) I would have been crucified.
I don’t know why I stayed silent about these bullies, I don’t know why I didn’t directly tell my dad – safe to say, it was complicated, especially as he knew one of my tormentors, having had a close friendship with his father (who too had sadly died at a young age). It ate me up inside when I regularly saw my persecutor sidle up to my dad on his twice weekly swim, cosying up, laughing together, but my dad wasn’t to know.
I did resent my dad for not spotting my social problems, but he wasn’t a mind reader, how could I expect him to know?
The trauma intensified, and of course there was only one outcome …
“Home James, and don’t spare the horses”
– An expression of pressing urgency that goes back to the mid-nineteenth century –
I would take every opportunity to escape into the safety of my daydreams. Behind the comfort of my daydreaming was an uncomfortable reflection that I endured during my non-MD life.
I would loathe others who I saw as ‘rounded people’, living their best life, living a reality.
Not unlike the sanitised and curated ‘perfect’ lives we’re exposed to on social media today, my perception was that others had things worked out, they’d cracked the code. But of course, I couldn’t allow myself to accept that they too might have problems, everyone does.
But the person I loathed the most was me.
The self-loathing over my secret madness, my drug of fantasy on tap, my doorway to dissociation.
Why didn’t I tell someone?
Who would believe my story of woe?
“A protagonist is engaged in a battle fought largely in the strange cellars of their own subconscious mind. At stake is the answer to the fundamental question that drives all drama: who am I?”
– Will Storr, The Science of Storytelling, chapter 2, The Flawed Self –
No one would believe me then. ‘Maladaptive Daydreaming’ was still something of the future.
I would spend as many waking hours as humanly possible locked in detailed committed daydreaming which now branched out into so many sectors of society.
At bus stops, on coaches, at airports I began to people watch. I could picture myself, not just as some hero, but occupy in my mind less glamorous lives: a garbage collector, a food vendor, office workers, a security guard, a stockbroker. Security and bodyguards were favourites as they provided ‘security’ around my buzzing brain.
IT WAS ALL ABOUT ME NOT BEING ME!
So, I left school, I went off to sports college and a local university to do leisure studies. I did reasonably well, not stand out, not drop out either.
I worked at this sports centre for, I think, almost 5 years and by this time had started drinking in the local public houses around three times per week. This continued after I left the sports centre and during my twenties, I picked up two friends: a colleague from the local post office (where I worked) and an eccentric gentleman who had slain Dracula (an inside joke).
From the outside we might have been considered misfits, but we had a bond. We had deep conversations about politics, history and travel as we supped pints of beer and put the world to rights.
I flitted on the peripheries of other groups, not unusual in a small town, and as the drinks flowed, I got into a few scrapes – fights I didn’t start, but that I did finish.
I’m speculating, but my faraway gazes, tapping, not concentrating on the conversations at hand, checking the time – all the secret giveaways that I was in a good daydream in public – were perhaps being noticed by my drinking buddy and my much-missed uncle, who I’d regularly pop into see. I’d try to suppress these outward signs, but I think they had suspicions I was seriously not wired correctly.
My fears fed my fantasy worlds. I had a particular dread of flying; the destinations of far-flung places were appealing but the flights terrified me. On an airplane I’d be a mess, the duty-free alcohol was a helpful companion but as the wheels hit the runway on the descent my best friend was always the MD. It’s safe to say, my dreams when I was back on ‘solid ground’ sky rocketed.
Walt Disney once said, “It’s kind of fun to do the impossible”. By this point I was inclined to disagree, it wasn’t a superpower anymore. I was living under the constant shadow of my MD, some days the shadow would be lighter, but it could also be very dark.
By my mid-to-late twenties I was hooked on the MD drug, a sneaky MD junkie whose best friend, comfort, safety, needle sharing buddy was the affliction itself.
The dreams, especially in private, but more difficult to hide in public, had such range: crying in emotional scenes I’d seen in a film, beating off the bad guys, and sexual, deeply, darkly sexual that I had to fight off.
It seems that I was quite liked by females though, but the general responses would be “my friend likes you, but she thinks you’re too strange to date” – they were very perceptive. Nonetheless, I managed to acquire a very small group of females, all attractive enough, all equally traumatized or troubled, we fed each other’s carnal sexual appetites, but this didn’t satisfy my MD attraction.
I was trapped; imprisoned in the twisted double world I’d created. I couldn’t admit this affliction to anyone, not to my friends, family, and certainly not my female acquaintances – not even with a gun to my head – because the only response I could imagine was laughter in my face. People – even psychiatrists – would think I was insane!
“I'm not a psychopath; I'm a fully functioning sociopath.
Do your research.”
– Arthur Conan Doyle’s ‘Sherlock Holmes’ –
I’d be arrogant to say Maladaptive Daydreaming is any more distressing than obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD), schizophrenia or psychosis, but the difference is, they have all been given a recognized diagnosis.
In 2003 my world would brighten for a while, out of the darkness came a beacon of light …
It was March the 29th when my heart almost stopped for this woman, younger in years, but self-assured and, as I was later to learn, incredibly intelligent, tough as nails, softer than silk, harder than hell, a bonny, bright, beautiful ray of golden auburn-haired sunshine that had just walked into the bar and into my life.
The smell of stale beer, bar snacks, the jukebox suddenly silenced, the chatter of the punters faded away, for a moment the world stopped on its axis, the crowd of people parted, I was hypnotised. I reverted to just being a satellite revolving around her sun …
I cannot write long about her, it’s not my place to do so, and it hurts too much.
The abridged story is, we met, we dated, we married, we went on some magical holidays and adventures – not your ‘Costa del Sol’ cocktail and suncream holidays, rather historic places, full of culture and mystery to be discovered.
In our own ways, we both had traumatic childhoods, and we found solace in each other. We both shared the desire to escape into other worlds, to follow the dream.
What started out as clinging to each other for support turned into feeding each other’s demons and daydreaming, and although we were blessed with good times, my MD was never far from the surface.
We all share our secrets in our marriages, but even here, I couldn’t fully admit to my terrible and eventually debilitating affliction. I’d always had an unhealthy relationship with alcohol and so it was, drinking became my new friend. A liquid drug that went some way to calm and dull the screaming in my head.
“Whatever happens
I'll leave it all to chance
Another heartache
Another failed romance.
On and on
Does anybody know what we are living for?”
– Lyrics from Queen’s “Show Must Go On” (1991) –
Something got lost along the way, it didn’t happen overnight, but towards the end it seemed we were only happy when planning or on a trip to London’s Tudor historic places and UK royal castles. These holidays were our common ground – alternative worlds – an opportunity to step away from the real one, to step back in time.
In my MD kingdom, I was working in the castle 700 years ago, and I think my wife did something similar, imagining herself living in a different period, being someone else, but, of course, the difference was that she had a handle on it, whereas I didn’t.
We trundled along, my wife’s job was high pressured, and I wasn’t an easy person to live with. Day-to-day life wasn’t as happy as it once was.
Then we shared a new trauma. For many years there had been pregnancies and non-pregnancies, this was much worse for her than for me. She longed for a baby, and so did I, but perhaps I was also fearful of what type of father I might become and if my affliction was hereditary.
We tried, and failed, and as I entered my forties, more questions came about having a baby.
In 2018, my wife suggested that we explore IVF (in vitro fertilisation), one of several techniques available to help people with fertility problems to have a baby. Naturally, this would require various tests for both of us; crucially, I’d need to take a blood test.
This is when my Maladaptive Daydreaming world imploded and came crashing to the ground.
Let’s press the pause button here – we need to rewind the VHS tape to unravel this malfunction in the matrix of my mind.
As we know, I can uber-focus on certain topics. One random, but relevant, subject I fixated on for years, even as a youngster, was health-related news reports, often from the Early Centre for Disease Control (CDC). In the mid-1980s, a mysterious new cancer started to crop up in these reports; at that time, it seemed that only homosexual men (and a few haemophiliacs) were affected. Early news reports labelled it the ‘gay disease’.
This was the start of the HIV/AIDS epidemic (human immunodeficiency virus/acquired immune deficiency syndrome). A virus that damages the cells in your immune system and weakens your ability to fight everyday infections and diseases.
Perhaps it also came onto my radar as I was a huge fan of the aforementioned rock juggernaut ‘Queen’, whose lead singer Freddie Mercury was homosexual. It wasn’t the extravagant parties of this community that interested me, it was the epidemiology of this new disease (I had the same curiosity with Ebola and Covid).
I was intrigued by how it came about, how old the disease might be, was it caused by the advent of globalization and greedy governments, deforesting pristine jungles, that resulted in the encroachment and crossover of the animal and human domains.
I admired the underfunded efforts of the scientists, researchers and doctors around the world, trying desperately to get a handle on ‘how once healthy, fit young men could be turning into skeletons and dying in their thousands?’.
It was a battlefield, not just in the hospitals, it was a war for ‘ACT UP’ (AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power), Larry Kramer, friends of Terrance Higgins. They had to fight for equality, treatment and fairness.
Why am I telling you all this?
Stay with me …
In the late 1980s, early 1990s, at the height of my MD, one of my musical idols, Queen frontman Freddie Mercury, was being hounded by the UK tabloid media – the stigma of being a gay man amid the AIDS pandemic. He kept his private life, private, and although he was reported to have contracted HIV in the early 1980s, it was in 1991, the day after publicly announcing his diagnosis, that he died from complications of the disease at the age of 45.
In 1992, a concert in tribute to him was held at Wembley Stadium, for benefit of AIDS awareness. My brother and I were lucky to attend (tickets were like gold dust), wearing our red ribbons with pride.
Another of my hyper-focused subject matters that fuelled my MD was the sport of boxing. In 1990, after starring in the Rocky IV movie, a blonde boxer appeared on the scene called Tommy Morrisson. The girls adored him, and he could hit you like an express train. He too subsequently caught HIV and his life fell apart.
You could say I had a morbid fascination with this disease.
In my thoughts were recollections of brief periods of reckless promiscuity. To my shame I too had rarely practiced protective heterosexual sex, and I had suppressed the trauma of the incident of sexual abuse in the darkest hidden depths of my mind.
Fast forward to IVF, and more importantly my need to take a blood test. In my broken mind, despite having no real evidence, I just couldn’t shake the possibility that I might have HIV, and worse, I could have passed this onto my wife.
This was to become my greatest fear …
I’d love to tell you that I faced this fear head on, stood up and was counted, took the jab in the arm and waited for the news.
“Life is infinitely stranger than anything
which the mind of man could invent.”
– Arthur Conan Doyle’s ‘Sherlock Holmes’ –
I never made the appointment for my blood test …
I was found later that day in my car with two litres of vodka (my poison of choice, not shaken, no ice) by my terrified dad as the police were seconds away from arresting me.
I had always drunk nightly to help me sleep, a way to numb the MD, but my drinking went nuclear, call it a ‘breakdown’, call it the start of the end of my marriage, call it a ‘shitshow’.
This affliction, which had always been my chosen hobby, pastime, safe place, happy place, place of “knights in shining armour”, “movie hero saves the day” or “nightwatchmen protecting the store” did a disappearing act.
Maladaptive Daydreaming ceased or more accurately did a complete 180-degree implosion which resulted in a void in my head.
What had happened to me?
Because of the fear of a blood result, “a blood scare”, I could now no longer access Maladaptive Daydreaming.
You could say, my mind had met its match.
You’d have thought my MD would have gone into hyperdrive, but it didn’t.
I was left with what I call ‘Black Brain’: it’s hard to describe, an emotional emptiness, a “nothingness” because I had never really spent any time in the real world, in REALITY.
If it wasn’t daydreaming, what was I supposed to think about?
Two years of as much alcohol as I could access, and self-medication followed. I needed to dull the fact that I wasn’t anyone, just a pastiche of other characters, I didn’t have the strength or the tools to face the world.
I was ‘out of it’, I can’t imagine how bad it must have been for my wife, family, couple of friends and clinicians to see me writhing in a stinking bed of my making.
I was confined, or ‘not let out’ to buy alcohol with my dwindling resources, screaming for drink.
I was passed from my wife and our house to my parents to give the other a break. Hiding bottles around the house when my wife was at work.
I stole money, I drank mouthwash and even nail polish remover.
I’m just thankful that when my wife contracted meningitis with pneumococcal pneumonia and was close to death – literally a sobering experience – that I stood up and was counted, raised the alarm and somehow navigated that disaster (with support from family).
I reunited with the bottle, but not my MD, and I had nightmares of epic proportions.
In the absence of my MD, I think my brain channelled the pain to the nighttime, I experienced weird, troubling and terrifying nightmares, perhaps this as my mind trying to make sense of the void left by the MD.
A couple of years later I made the hardest decision of my life, to divorce my wife.
I didn’t want to leave her, I think of her every day, but I needed to free her from my terrible affliction.
No wife could have tried more, maybe one day she will let me be her friend.
I managed to stop drinking – I don’t know what got me to stop, the ‘bottle’ was my friend, but I knew it would soon kill me as it had my kind friend from the sports centre who was taken before his time.
I also stopped functioning in the real world.
For about three years I wasn’t able to engage with the world, I spiralled downwards, my life consisted of bed, nightmares, sofa, nightmares, rinse and repeat. I guess experts might call it ‘depression’, ‘a breakdown’; my family were exasperated and often unsure how to help.
I was questioning my existence, my purpose, my place in the world. It was a time of self-reflection, not just for me, but for my dad too, he was questioning what more he could have done, and at the same time accepting that I had a mental illness.
But one day something did change, perhaps it had been gradual, but it almost felt like it happened overnight, I decided I didn’t want to ‘throw in the towel’, I decided that even though I was ‘knocked down’ that I needed to get back up again.
I wanted to be remembered differently.
I am now 5 years sober.
Maybe it was the thought of my young niece and nephew being told “Well, your uncle died homeless, drunk in a sleeping bag”, and I also want to be there for my parents as they reach their 80s.
I wanted to write a different ending – despite the continuing excruciating daily headaches and nightmares – that’s why I’m sharing my story.
I want to raise awareness about Maladaptive Daydreaming.
I want to bring this illness, alongside an army of others, to the attention of the psychiatric community for recognition, classification and therefore diagnosis.
“I guess I'm learning
I must be warmer now
I'll soon be turning
'Round the corner now
Outside the dawn is breaking
But inside in the dark I'm aching to be free
Show must go on
Show must go on
Inside my heart is breaking
My make-up may be flaking
But my smile still stays on”
– Lyrics from Queen’s “Show Must Go On” (1991) –
As I said at the beginning, Maladaptive Daydreaming has shaped me but won’t define me.
I have accepted my illness.
I’ve tried to find forgiveness for those who have hurt me, and I hope for forgiveness from those that I have hurt.
I’m still not well, and I’m still in pain, but like a boxer who has hit the canvas, I get back up to fight another day.
I’ve found nature, I drum, I volunteer, I’m making new friends, this is my rehabilitation.
I have a purpose: I support my parents as they age, I’m building bridges with my brother, and trying to be the best uncle that I can be.
It’s never too late.
“It does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live.”
– J. K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone (1997) –
And if you were wondering, I did eventually have that blood test …
I got a clean bill of health.
We all have taken our own paths, this is my journey, I hope reading my story might help you.
I’m not a medical expert but I have some experience of Maladaptive Daydreaming, and unlike 30, 40 years ago, there is a growing awareness, acceptance and advice out there in the world.
I’ve signposted useful articles, videos, articles, forums and people to follow below, and I’ve reflected on some of the avenues available to you or your loved one. I hope they help.
Ultimately, I want Maladaptive Daydreaming to be recognised.
We need ‘people power’ to campaign for proper change for our ‘Madness’ or however you describe yours.
Please join the movement.
© James C. Relton 2025
Share not Shame
Maladaptive Daydreaming is nothing to be ashamed of. There’s no shame whatsoever, talk to people.
By sharing, we remove the stigma. Tell people about this article, talk to friends, family, anyone. The more that people know about MD, the better.
And importantly, approach your medical practitioner, don’t let them ignore you. Be assertive, they probably haven’t heard about MD. Share the research (see ‘Useful Info’). And if they don’t listen, go over their heads and write to their boss.
I couldn’t talk about it when I was younger, but now we have the power to spread the word!
Treat the Trauma
I never really dealt with the underlying issues, I never really confronted my demons, I never really treated my trauma head on.
If you’ve been abused, victimised, bullied – speak to someone you trust. Seek therapy or counselling. Report a crime. I know it won’t be easy, but if you can find someone to help you, try to get to the root cause of any trauma. I didn’t face some of my fears, if only I could, I think it would have helped.
Love yourself. Treat yourself as you’d treat a close friend if they were having difficulties.
Heal not Harm
Monitor when you turn to MD and why, try to identify your triggers (journalling can help). This awareness can give you some agency (and accountability) to reduce or remove the causes.
Mindfulness, being in the present moment, can help moderate the frequency of MD.
Be kind to yourself, prioritise a good diet, sleep, exercise, fresh air etc (where possible).
Try and find something you love that isn’t MD (for me it’s drumming), a welcome distraction that you can focus your energy and mind on.
Accept that it probably won’t just stop. Try to gently deflect and direct your MD, and your powerful imagination into something more positive such as the creative sector, dance, film making, photography, painting, writing. I have no doubt that many screenwriters, actors, composers and authors have channelled their daydreaming into their artistic endeavours.
This is not an exhaustive list; it is but a few pointers that I hope might help.
I trust that my tale might help you avoid some of the pitfalls. Thank you for reading, I wish you well on your journey.
With love,
James
"We are not here to curse the darkness, but to light the candle that can guide us through that darkness to a safe and sane future."
With thanks
My love to my Mum, Dad, and younger brother Graham, who for large periods suffered this illness as much as I did.
This is also for Dennis Relton, the consummate example of bravery.
To the much-missed Jamie Broadbent and to Lee Barker who welcomed me into their groups and looked after me.
To Rob, Naz and above all Tracy for friendship.