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Since we moved when I was 5 years and 2 months, I know all of my memories prior to that were age 4 or 5....the memories ranged from playing baseball, getting water from our neighbors that had a water fountain in their garage, my Father leaving months before we moved, getting in trouble from our maid when I knocked over the ironing board when she was ironing, going to church.
I remember my mother being pregnant with my brother, who is less than three years younger than I am -- and what she was wearing one day with her enormous red gingham belly. Also remember our neighbors coming to stay with me while we were waiting for him to be born.
I have a couple of very distinct recollections from when I must have been very young. One was when I was sleeping in my crib one night and I woke up and saw something dark at the end of the crib. I sort of froze in fear and laid there until I finally fell back asleep. When daylight came, I looked up and realized it was some clothing my mom had tossed over the top of the crib rail, and I was very relieved to see what it was.
Another time, I remember sitting in my highchair, eating Cheerios that my mom had put on a plate for me to pick up and eat. She was ironing in the kitchen and watching a little TV. We had one of the first TV's to come out, and our neighbors would come by to watch this new fangled contraption.
Being that I was still in my crib and still using a high chair, I must have been around two at the most at that time.
I remember a pair of house slippers that were pink and made to resemble a pink bunny. They were made of a pink, furry material that was soft and fuzzy and had bunny ears and tiny brown glass eyes. My mother said I got those on either my first or second birthday as a present from my aunt. I remember how much I loved them, loved wearing them and loved the color and the soft, fuzzy feel of them.
I also remember sleeping in my crib. It was painted white and was made of iron, not wood. This was in the 1930s. LOL, it was probably painted white lead based paint. Later on, I remember sleeping in another bed that had side rails half way from the head to keep the person sleeping in it from falling out of bed at night.
My earliest memory was of being in my carriage (so less than a year old) in a sunny side room of the house where we lived when I was born. It was daytime, and I was napping. My mom and a couple of women friends came into the room, waking me. The other ladies wanted to see me, and I recall my mom trying to make me smile, with her voice and expressions.
All I remember was that I was very irritated by all this, and burst out crying.
I do not believe that it's impossible to remember anything prior to 3 years of age. My dad died at age 32, when I was 3, and I have distinct memories of him prior to that (I couldn't very well have memories of him after that, now could I?).
JFK was assassinated less than a week before my second birthday. The half dozen or so TV channels were my babysitter and all I saw for days on end was the coverage of his death and funeral. I didn't know what was happening but I vividly remember knowing something was very wrong and it is my earliest memory.
Question: What is the very earliest distinct memory that you can identify in your life history?
And do you precisely remember how old you were at the point of this earliest memory, where you were, what you were doing, et al (as some people may have an "earliest memory" they can identify but can't quite pinpoint how old they were at that point in time or what context or set-of-circumstances they were in the midst of at that moment in time of this earliest memory)?
I'll start with my own earliest distinct memory: As to myself, I remember laying on the floor (relatively flat on my stomach) of my shared bedroom playing with some toys. And I remember my mother coming to the bedroom door saying I should come over to the kitchen to have breakfast.
And as to how old I was at this moment in time: How do I know when (or relatively when) in time this was and hence how old I was (whether my precise age or a relative guesstimate of my age at that point in time)? Well, my mother arrived back from taking my older brother to his very first day of kindergarten (the school was 3-4 blocks away) and my older brother is approximately 1.5 years older than me. Hence, my brother had to be 5 years old at that time (i.e., he would have turned five years old about 1.5 months earlier before his very first day of kindergarten and school starts in early September of any given year) and therefore I must have been 3 years old or, more precisely, getting near 3.5 years old at the point of my earliest distinct memory.
That is, even if I think I could possibly conjure up any other early memory(ies), I can't distinctly identify how old I was at that point in time or the context, time, place, et al where this possible even-earlier memory occurred or allegedly occurred. So the earliest distinct memory I have where I can ALSO identify time, place, my precise age at the time, et al of this remembered event is what I have shared above.
So, how about all of you? What have you got to share here about what you know or else think is your earliest distinct memory and precisely or near-precisely how old you were at the very point of this remembered point in time?
Interesting question.
Mine was of being put down for a nap. I had a mobile and my mother wound it up. I remember the mobile had blue, green and turquoise translucent fish that made a pattern that seemed to dance on the pale pink wall behind me. My mother was wearing a gold charm bracelet that jangled as she wound the mobile.
There was a music box that played typical music box music. My mother closed the blinds and said something too me. I heard the door close softly.
After that, I guess, I must have fallen asleep.
From discussing this with my father, the description of the room, the mobile, and where the window was, he pieced together that I was under a year old, because we moved soon after that. I also remember that I was the only child in the room, and the position of the door and the closet.
What is strange to me, is it's a rather unremarkable event. Commonplace. Why do I recall it?
We moved frequently so based on that I was 4 or maybe turning 4. I don't remember the order of my memories and most of them are like 2-5 second flashes.
- One was playing dolls with another girl my age in that home
- One was being afraid that my baby sitter would hit me if I didn't eat her food (she did hit us but I don't remember that part) my parents didn't know until my brother told them
- I remember playing outside that home but again the memory is very fuzzy.
Memories prior to age three are not reliably actual memories. They are more likely false memories, built subconsciously on things like photos one has been shown of a particular event, hearing family stories or others' retelling of the event or occurrence, and one's brain filing in the gaps and categorizing it as a personal memory, when it may not be. Or, commonly, you remember something that actually occurred when you were older, but attribute it as happening, incorrectly, when you were much younger. Overall, development and storage of that type of memory is not something the brain is usually developed enough to be capable of until age 3+, presuming normal development.
In my case it's true because I have zero memories of things that happened before that. The thing with me is that we moved frequently, my parents divorced around that time and I am the youngest so it was easier for me to figure out how old I was.
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