How Far Back Can You Remember?

[calvin]

I have vague memories that go back to about being 3 years old. In one memory, I was left on my parents bed or in my crib the late afternoon or early evening. The sun was shining in the side window onto the inside of the front wall. A tree was outside the window and the shadows of its wind-blown leaves were dancing on the wall near me. I remember being visually in awe of this and then becoming afraid. Over stimulation I suppose for my little brain. I started to cry out loud.....end of memory.

I have many memories, still vivid, starting about age 1 1/2, progressed to nearly full recall by age 3+.

I'd suggest everyone has all their memories intact, recorded in their subconscious mind, but the "active" brain has to suppress the information in order for us to function in the now.

If I want to remember a specific item, a name, a detail, if it's relevant to me and I WANT to remember, I think about what it is, then put the thought out of my active mind. The detail(s) will then come to me after my subconscious mind processes the information. It's like a passive search that runs in the background. After a time, maybe long, 2-3 days if it's further back, but usually within 30 min. to 2 hours, it will pop up in my active mind. BINGO.

That is insane. Come on. Eighteen months? I'm not saying you're not being honest, just that the date stamp on those mental images is wrong.

Hello calvin here.
I don't think there is reason to doubt the date stamp accuracy really.
I remember Mum telling my eldest sister to put me in the cot for an afternoon nap. No date reference and some of the details about the room, mum said were wrong. So I guess though I remember the event and in particular my hostile feelings toward my sister for picking me up, I was too young to remember details too clearly.
What I can not explain even to myself is how at that very young age I seemed to be able to understand English though I would have been too young to speak... but the memory is there.
I remember this lady coming to look after us while mum was in hospital Much later on, I described her dress and her shoes and asked who was this? and mum said in surprise that it was Vera and I was 10 months old. That is how I know my memory goes back at least that far.
I remember the giddy, sort of falling sensation of my very first unaided step, and my sister's excited calling out to mum that I had started to walk. It was quite possible their excitement was what cemented that event in my memory.
And daninthelionsden, I have that same memory of the shadow of a tree scaring me..age had to be less than four, but older than two.

 

[Roro1972]

I remember the doctor slapping me twice cause he was not sure which end to slap.

 

[smaller]

That sounds like something a shrink tells a lady. Next thing you know, social workers are showing up at her parents door with police in tow. Like I said, I'm not saying you're lying. I do think it's not accurate.

What's your earliest memory(s)? Pretty certain of my own and age. Lived on a farm til age 4-1/2 and have a lot of farm memories from 3 on.

 

[Mike]

Okay, if you guys say so. I've never been the sharpest tool in the box, so maybe this is another example of cranial capabilities that my mind can't even fathom.

I do have vague memories of my preschool days. My mother dropping me off at this little one-room Baptist church, and I never wanted to be there.

 

[daninthelionsden]

Thanks for your responses. I knew there were people who had the ability to recall early childhood events other than just myself. I've had people try and invalidate my childhood memories for whatever reason. You guys being able to recall your memories makes me feel more confident in my recalling mine. My time stamp on the tree leaves dancing on the wall is somewhere between 1.5 - 3 years. We moved from that house when I was three. I can't imagine being younger than 1.5 years and still retaining the memory. I recalled the floor plan to the house and made a sketch of what I remember the house looking like from memory. I was told by my mother the floor plan I drew was very close. We drove to the address on my birth certificate and took photographs. I had sketched the outside of the house from memory before we left home. I compared it to the house after we arrived a few hours later. Again the sketch was very close.