I Get Severe Anxiety From TV/Games?? Am i Alone Here?

[Eugene]

Hi.

So yeah i'll get right into it.

I get anxiety from TV & Games, specifically shows following characters, and games with stories.

Mostly its when the characters I like make a decision that's kind of bad or evil in some way.

I'll give examples:

There's this show called The 100 it's about this colony of people in space who are sent to the ground and have to fight for their lives, anyway without spoiling too much at the end of 1 of the seasons, inside a mountain, my favourite character Clarke makes a decision that impacts a lot of lives.

I spent the next few days with anxiety attacks, going over the event in my head trying to justify her actions, even though she had no choice, I couldn't shake anxiety over the fact she really did just do something that was.. well, quite bad.

When reading about the Lore of a game I enjoy, World of Warcraft, I came across a story about the leader of the undead faction, where she essentially does human experimentation..

I always thought she was morally ambiguous til then, but that made me convinced she's evil, and I couldn't stop getting anxiety attacks when I thought about the poor person who was experimented on, when I pictured the scene in my head.

The most recent is with a game called starcraft.

I've actually had anxiety attacks to the point where I've had to post on the forums to try and find out if I'm justified in trying to defend that character's decisions, as it's giving me really bad anxiety attacks right now when I'm thinking about it in my head..

If you want to give it a read its here: http://eu.battle.net/sc2/en/forum/topic/17610993003

But i'll warn it's a very long post.

So yeah.. I've got to ask, am I the only person who gets really emotionally involved with fiction? I feel like I'm going crazy..

I can't just give up the fiction either though, as it's really the only stuff I've got to keep me occupied right now.

[sherlock holmes]

I've definitely got incredibly emotionally invested in fictional characters. It began with Harry Potter and then immersing myself in fanfiction, then I moved to Sherlock and have been obsessed with that ever since. I've cried over fanfiction I've read. But I've not experienced anything to the extent you have.

Do you have an awareness of where fiction ends and reality begins? Because the situations you described are all made up and not real, yes in your imagination you can picture it and think about it, but it's still not real. It doesn't therefore matter so much if a character does something bad because it's never actually happened in real life and no-ones been hurt.

I actually found reading fanfiction about difficult subjects a great way of dealing with those issues internally and coming to terms with things, because I knew that whatever the characters faced and whatever decisions they made, it was not real, and it was safe for me to examine without being hurt.

Have you ever talked about this to someone in real life, like a therapist? I think it would be a good idea to. It would be better for you to get your enjoyment back and not have anxiety attacks over it.

[Eugene]

Quote:

Originally Posted by sherlock holmes

I've definitely got incredibly emotionally invested in fictional characters. It began with Harry Potter and then immersing myself in fanfiction, then I moved to Sherlock and have been obsessed with that ever since. I've cried over fanfiction I've read. But I've not experienced anything to the extent you have.

Do you have an awareness of where fiction ends and reality begins? Because the situations you described are all made up and not real, yes in your imagination you can picture it and think about it, but it's still not real. It doesn't therefore matter so much if a character does something bad because it's never actually happened in real life and no-ones been hurt.

I actually found reading fanfiction about difficult subjects a great way of dealing with those issues internally and coming to terms with things, because I knew that whatever the characters faced and whatever decisions they made, it was not real, and it was safe for me to examine without being hurt.

Have you ever talked about this to someone in real life, like a therapist? I think it would be a good idea to. It would be better for you to get your enjoyment back and not have anxiety attacks over it.

Yeah I have an awareness of where it begins and ends, I know it's not real, that doesn't stop me from getting as involved with it as I do.

I think really its down to the fact I don't really have anything else going on in my life except for gaming & TV, this is probably the reason I get as worked up as I do about fictional things.

It's really weird.. I know it shouldn't affect me, I know it's not real, but I just sometimes cant shake the anxiety.

But even I'm shocked at how hard this recent episode has hit me, maybe it isn't the fiction afterall, maybe that just triggered the fact I might be becoming resistant to make fluoxetine (of which I'm currently on the highest possible dose)

I get the feeling if I went to a therapist they'd only say what I've said myself, that its because I don't have anything else happening in my life, so I'm investing almost everything into the games/tv

[Unbreakable.]

I think that this is very common to a certain extend.
As this is affecting you so negatively though it is definitely something worth working on.
A therapist or counselor might be able to help you find a way how to lower your overall anxiety levels, give you suggestions about how to handle the intense emotions and might be able to help you find things outside of fiction that make up your life. Their job is not to tell you why you experience xyz, but to help you find ways to experience less distress about it.