How much do you remember in your first 20 years of life?
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Anonymous
| I’m 45 and remember all of that. Well I can’t quite remember what I wore under my gown for college graduation, but I remember my brother driving my friends and I over in the back of his truck, how hot it was, and playing beer pong with my parents at the party we threw at our off campus home after. I know we ate dinner as a family every night as a family of 8 in elementary and have visceral memories of a few dinners but otherwise it’s just a “I know that’s how it was” thing. I have some pretty distinct memories from preschool and the house I lived in until I was three (playing trolls on the playground swinging bridge for example). My parents are both dead, and one has been for decades, but I have vivid dreams about them almost weekly and can “feel” what it was like to love them at different ages if that makes sense - for example, I have dreams with “elementary school mom” and dreams with “young adult terminally ill mom” athat bring back all the feels from those ages. |
Anonymous
| I’m 55 and have a very vivid memory from early childhood until the time when I was a new mom. Then, things get fuzzy. I think sleep deprivation as a new mom and parent of young children took a toll. Now, as my kids are older, I think my memory is actually getting better but there is a definite gap during my children’s early years. |
Anonymous
So true. I have a very good memory even as far back as preschool, but I can hardly remember the details of the first year of my kids’ lives. |
Anonymous
| Yes, in great detail. |
Anonymous
| I don't even concentrate enough on my childhood to bring up memories. What's the point? Childhood is over. I am adult. |
Anonymous
| 50 and I remember all of that. Fwiw I know people like me who remember a lot and people who remember very little and it doesn’t seem to have a lot to do with how happy they are (or were,l as children, as far as i can tell.) I think it’s often just so a brain difference if you remember a lot or a little (though obviously in extreme circumstances there can be other factors.) |
Anonymous
| Nope. I hate that I can't remember many things. I've never known how to be present. I blame my dad. |
Anonymous
Trying to remember the past is the complete opposite of being present. In any event, what is the point of remembering childhood? Why is it important to do so? Are people seeking to do a deep dive into recalling childhood events to aid in determing the reasons (fault actually) for why they are the way they are now? Looking to remember how they were neglected and mistreated, to see the roots of their current awful life? |
Anonymous
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I was just thinking about all this since I recently got together with HS friends. I can answer all of your questions, yes. There are still some incidents and events (good and bad) that I remember well and remember how I felt.
A lot of it feels like a blur, or blurred together in a way. Almost like, I can't believe I was that little person all those years ago it's just so different from my life now (though nothing dramatic happened then or now). I guess that's just more genetically the passing of time and struggling with how to process all of it? |
Anonymous
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watch out for this, dwelling on this can be unhealthy:
Hi, I'm understand where you're coming from. I have a stepdaughter with BPD who is close in age to your son, and who also has delusional memories of childhood. Though nobody's childhood is perfect, her descriptions of childhood "trauma" have gotten more outlandish and less believable as the years with diagnosed BPD drag on. Recently she's gone so far as to imply there was sexual abuse by her father, which is totally untrue. She claims that she has been bullied by almost everyone around her. To her, just offering her help would constitute "bullying," because in her eyes, an offer of help is demeaning and suggests that she's incompetent. In summary, it seems she is trying to recast past slights into trauma, and use the trauma as an excuse to hurl insults and unrepressed rage at her family members. In reality, she's the bully, and her interpretation of events is pure emotion, and not based on fact--sometimes there might be a kernel of truth, but she warps and reinterprets events to such a degree that she's delusional. Rather than face reality, she'll lie. Having said that, sometimes she doesn't even bother with lying, but instead she'll withdraw and avoid life completely. I can't help but try to see through her rage. Her furious outbursts tend to coincide with current disappointments--when she can't handle the day-to-day stresses of a job or studies, and she quits suddenly, or whenever things don't go her way. I know I'm judgmental, but when she experiences disappointments, she will not act like an adult, take responsibility or take things in stride; rather, she blames others for her predicaments. As her BPD has dragged on, increasingly she blames her parents and siblings for a traumatic childhood. In her mind, the past trauma is the reason she is failing to function in an adult world. I guess this is easier for her than facing the truth: she's the only reason she's dysfunctional. She resents being so dependent on her family for everything, but she can't step up and act like an adult and take some responsibility. So she's stuck in the past, replaying and reinterpreting upsetting memories, blaming her distant childhood for all her current problems. Though this view of the world has tired her out (with years spent ruminating about the distant past), she can't seem to give it up and look forward. She doesn't want to accept things as they are and move on. It's very frustrating for her whole family. It's hard to know what to do, because the experts say that we're supposed to validate her feelings. But if feelings are based on a delusion, validating the delusion seems counterproductive. There's no arguing with rage. Yet the rage seems to increase in intensity as the years go on. The way I see it, the rage has increased as her ability to function as an adult has deteriorated. Her peers have grown up, and yet she hasn't, and she's feeling FOMO and shame, and she's coping by blaming her predicament on a bad childhood. https://bpdfamily.com/message_board/index.php?topic=356686.0;prev_next=prev |
Anonymous
We're you emotionally neglected? If so, this is very normal, because you spent so much time in lalaland playing escapist to your own life. Me too. |
Anonymous
she blames her parents and siblings for a traumatic childhood. In her mind, the past trauma is the reason she is failing to function in an adult world. I guess this is easier for her than facing the truth: she's the only reason she's dysfunctional. |
Anonymous
Yes, of course. Truly restful sleep is required for the brain to carry out the process of laying down long term memory. The majority of our sleep requirement as human beings, in fact, is for the restorative effect to our brain rather than to the rest of our physical bodies. Sleep deprivation is very destructive to health overall, but especially to brain health and it can drive an otherwise mentally healthy person into delusional psychosis in fairly short order if sleep is deprived nearly entirely. |
Anonymous
| Yes. I remember a lot of my childhood. So many amazing memories with my best friends (we have been friends since we were three) and family. We still occasionally talk and laugh about many things from our past. |
Anonymous
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I have a very good memory. The pro is remembering a lot. The con is not being able to bury really horrible times. Breakups, bullies, bring picked last in sports, the horrible home life with two parents who had massive problems of their own are things I cannot put past me.
Still talk to people from elementary school and HS (two different areas) and happy to have bridges with some of the good people from those times. |