Do I Daydream Too Much? Quiz With Explanations To Help You Find Out.

Lately, with the new awareness of maladaptive daydreaming, many individuals are now asking themselves, “Do I daydream too much?”

What you once thought was a healthy and normal coping mechanism or stress reliever, may actually be out of control and contributing to your current unhappiness in life. But how can you know if your daydreaming is normal, or entering the realm of maladaptive? Below are some questions to ask yourself to help you find out.

*Note: these questions are not and should not be used as a diagnostic tool. If you’re concerned about your daydreaming, please speak with a qualified professional.*

Do You Daydream Too Much? Answer These Questions To Find Out.

1. Do you ever spend hours at a time doing nothing but daydreaming?

Many maladaptive daydreamers spend excessive amounts of time daydreaming. If you daydream vividly for more than four hours a day and can daydream consistently for hours at a time, you may be a maladaptive daydreamer.

Many non-maladaptive individuals only daydream in short bursts throughout the day, while maladaptive daydreamers daydream for hours at a time on a single storyline or topic. Maladaptive daydreamers can daydream anywhere from just a few hours a day, to 12+ hours.

2. Is your urge to daydream so strong that you neglect your basic needs such as getting ready and eating?

Maladaptive daydreamers often feel a compulsion to daydream so strongly, that they will neglect their basic needs. When I was struggling with my maladaptive daydreaming, I’d daydream in the morning instead of getting ready for school and work. I’d also had a hard time peeling myself away from daydreaming in order to make even basic meals, so I just wouldn’t eat.

3. Has your daydreaming interfered with your ability to succeed in your schooling or career?

Going to school as a maladaptive daydreamer was a nightmare. I would neglect homework until the last second and often zone out during class. I sometimes couldn’t focus on homework unless I tried to integrate it into my daydreaming, (i.e. my character was super good at math and I could act it out by doing my own math homework.) In college, I had a hard time pulling myself out of daydreams in order to attend class, and as such my grades suffered and I lost my scholarship.

At work, I was often distracted and zoning out the second I got the chance. I had a hard time succeeding and advancing in my career even though I knew I was talented enough to because I’d keep pushing off responsibilities and wasn’t able to focus. I would also arrive late, and take long lunch breaks, and eventually, it led me to get fired.

4. Do you think you daydream too much?

A key factor in maladaptive daydreaming is that it causes you distress in your normal life. So if you think you daydream too much and it’s negatively interfering with your life, you probably do daydream too much. Don’t doubt your intuition.

5. Does your daydreaming interfere with your ability and desire to make and keep relationships with other people?

As a maladaptive daydream, I would blow off dates, social, and family events, have a hard time engaging in conversations with others, and didn’t want to make friends preferring my daydream characters to real life.

Many typical hangout activities, such as watching movies, were hard for me because they would trigger my daydreaming. Large parties and group settings also made it very easy for me to zone out and not participate.

6. Do you prefer the characters in your daydream over the people you know in real life?

If a person in my real life said something funny or if I thought they seemed cool, I would add their jokes and characteristics into my daydream or have one of my current characters steal their lines, rather than getting to know the actual person. I preferred fantasizing about fictional and impossible lovers, rather than dating and exploring a chance to love in real life.

7. Do you feel strong emotional attachments to the characters in your daydream?

Depending on your daydream of the moment, do you find yourself feeling happy, loved, sad, depressed, etc? Do you feel so attached to your daydream characters that you can’t imagine living without them? Have you ever cried or laughed in real life because of something you experienced in a daydream? Maladaptive daydreamers often feel strong emotional connections to their daydreams.

8. Would you rather stay home alone and daydream than attend social events, work, or other obligations?

Many maladaptive daydreamers have a hard time attending social events, their jobs, school, or anything else as their main desire in life is to spend time daydreaming. If you find yourself perfectly content when you’re locked in your room all day daydreaming, and irritated by having to go out somewhere, you may be a maladaptive daydreamer.

9. Do you wake up each day with a strong desire to start daydreaming?

When I was maladaptive daydreaming, the first thing that I wanted to do in the morning was daydream, and I would often daydream so much that I wouldn’t get ready or eat breakfast so that I could spend as much time as possible daydreaming before I had to leave for the day’s obligations.

10. Do you put off falling asleep in order to continue daydreaming?

Do you find yourself putting off and neglecting sleep so that you can continue your daydreams? I would almost always find myself staying up till three or later daydreaming, even though my body was physically exhausted. It was almost impossible for me to turn off my daydreams in order to sleep.

11. Do you pace or perform any sort of repetitive movement to help you daydream such as finger tapping, rocking, or spinning?

Pacing was my preferred method of repetitive movement when daydreaming. I would pace so much that every place I’d ever lived developed circle-shaped tracks in the carpet. If I couldn’t pace, I would often rock or sway. This would happen even in public when other people could see and earned me the nickname “the rocker.”

Driving, swinging on a swing, hiking, and ellipticals were also good movements for keeping my daydreams going. Something about doing repetitive movements seems to help maladaptive daydreamers stay in their worlds and move their daydreams forward.

12. Do you feel irritated or annoyed when someone interrupts your daydreaming, and have a strong desire to return to daydreaming as soon as possible?

If someone knocking on your door, prolonged conversations, or interrupting you as you listen to music sends strong feelings of irritation through you, you may be a maladaptive daydreamer. Maladaptive daydreamers typically have strong negative feelings when they’re not able to daydream, and will feel a strong desire to return to their daydreaming until the interruption is gone, often making them appear distracted or aloof.

13. When something happens that makes it harder for you to daydream as much as you usually do, do you feel increasingly distressed, irritable, and/or stressed by your inability to find time to daydream?

If a change in your day-to-day life, such as getting a new roommate, family visitors, going on vacation, having to work longer hours, etc. takes away your time and/or place to daydream, do you feel yourself getting increasingly more and more distressed by your inability to daydream as you normally would? Many maladaptive daydreamers feel distressed when they’re not able to spend time in their daydream worlds like they want to.

14. Do books, music, television, or movies often trigger your daydreams?

Music especially seems to be a strong trigger for maladaptive daydreamers. Many will listen to the same song over and over again that matches their daydream, and find that loud music helps them better immerse in their daydreaming world.

They also often struggle to read a book or watch a movie without having to stop in the middle to daydream. Often, when they like an element of a show or book, they will integrate it into their main daydream.

15. Do your daydreams involve themes of power, violence, idealized self, power and control, and/or sexual arousal.

Many maladaptive daydreamers have daydreams that are more violent and sexual than regular daydreamers. They often will dream about being a powerful idealized version of themselves and getting revenge on the people who’ve hurt them. Or they may even daydream about violence being done to them.

They often daydream about love and sex, being overall desirable to those around them. Their daydreams may revolve around a fictional world or involve real-world scenarios and characters.

16. Does daydreaming feel pleasurable to you?

Many maladaptive daydreamers feel a “dopamine head rush” when they start daydreaming that seems to take away the negative or distressing feelings that they’ve been experiencing. Their daydreaming brings feelings of happiness and pleasure to them.

However, this isn’t to be confused with the feelings of constantly feeling unfulfilled and depressed with their real life, something which daydreaming may actually contribute to by causing them to neglect their day-to-day responsibilities and underachieve.

17. Did you experience trauma or neglect as a child?

Many maladaptive daydreamers experience abuse or neglect as a child, though not all. Some maladaptive daydreamers are not aware of when or why they started daydreaming. However, if you started daydreaming as a child as a coping method for a bad home life, and feel like you have since become addicted and/or dependent on your daydreaming, this could be a strong indicator that you do have maladaptive daydreaming.

18. Do you perform facial expressions or physical actions such as arm movements while daydreaming in order to act out your daydreams?

Many maladaptive daydreamers act out their daydreams to varying extents with facial expressions and other movements, such as waving their arms or hands. They often feel shame, embarrassment, and/or worry when someone catches them daydreaming and making these movements.

They may also research elements they want to use in their daydreams in order to help their daydream feel more “real.”

19. Have you been diagnosed with ADHD, depression, or anxiety?

These disorders are often associated with maladaptive daydreaming. If you’ve been previously diagnosed or suspect you may have one of these disorders and feel that you daydream more than average, it could be a sign that you have maladaptive daydreaming.

20. Do you have a dominant or favorite storyline, world, or plot that you favor?

While more typical daydreaming usually consists of short bursts of daydreams on a variety of topics, maladaptive daydreamers usually have one or two main plots or worlds that they spend the majority of their time daydreaming in. These worlds are often very elaborate and evolve with the daydreamer.

A maladaptive daydreamer may spend entire days or weeks reliving the same scene over and over again with minor changes, before moving on to the next scene. Their current life or elements from a movie or book they’ve read may also be integrated into their dominant daydreaming world.

In Conclusion:

I hope these questions have given you better insight into whether or not you daydream too much, and if you could possibly be a maladaptive daydreamer. If you do believe you’re a maladaptive daydreamer, I strongly encourage you to meet with a professional to further discuss your daydreaming and underlying reasons for developing maladaptive daydreaming. I believe that identifying your daydreaming triggers is key if eventually gaining control of your daydreaming.

Dr. Eli Somer, the man who first recognized maladaptive daydreaming and coined the term, has developed a 16-point diagnosis scale that he believes can help diagnose maladaptive daydreamers from non-maladaptive daydreamers.

If you’re not ready or unable to speak with a professional, then perhaps the members of our Maladaptive Daydreaming Forum can help you understand more about maladaptive daydreaming. Join us today to share your thoughts and experiences.