Significant events of which you have absolutely no memory.

[JemAppelleLafayette]

Has anybody else experienced this (barring brain injury etc)?

I’m in my mid thirties. Both my parents have recently described something that happened when I would have been 18.
Apparently I became very very sick with a strep infection, so unwell that hospital was seriously considered. Happily, I didn’t need to be hospitalised and recovered at home over the uni holidays. My dad mentioned it today and spoke of choking up at a concert because they were so worried about me before the infection was diagnosed. I work with lymphoma patients now so can well understand the terror of having a teenage daughter describing unusual lumps at her lymph sites.

I do not remember any of this!! I remember the concert and large portions of the year in question (first break up- sob!) but absolutely nothing of this incident.
Curious to hear if any body else has had a similar experience.

Not exactly the same but I was at a workshop the other day and we were asked to recall our favorite meal from childhood. Everybody else seemed to be able to put their finger on something but I couldn’t and still can’t really recall any particular meal we used to have.

I know we ate, obviously but I have no memory of any specific meals we had.

Well, most of uni. That would be drink related though.

My Mum has taken to remembering things that didn't happen. Not sure if it's age or lies.

I wonder why you have no memory of remembering your illness. You know, telling your mates, etc.

I dont't remember 9/11, I'd have been 16.

I got lost at a brownie camp once. I remember being found but I don’t remember anything else. I was gone all day!

Awrite my parents are only 59 and 60. They don’t have form for describing events etc that didn’t happen, AFAIK. I’m not really in touch with any body from that period of my life. I do wonder if I just didn’t realise how sick I was.
Ineedawee How strange! I wonder what you got up to. Apparently I wandered into a battery chicken shed while on holiday at a gîte in France, and came out distraught. No memory of that either.

This isnt exactly significant, but I have no recollection of my family sitting down together to eat dinner. I know from what my parents and brother have told me that we always sat down together every night at the kitchen table to eat, but I literally can't remember it at all! Not even Christmas dinners!
It's quite sad really as I always I insist my kids and I eat dinner together as I feel its an important thing to do as a family.

Yes lots - but mine is trauma / PTSD related.

kittens and whoopi interesting that your forgotten events almost match! Maybe mealtimes just don’t feel significant in childhood, but you’d think the repetition would help.

Lulu so sorry about your experiences

I have this, it's a running joke in my family. They will chat about events and things we've done, and although I know I must have been there I don't remember it.

We have pictures to prove holidays and family events, but apart from a few select memories I just don't recall them actually happening.

I struggle to remember all the details of my dd horrific birth, I was so off my head with incredible pain, felt dazed got a good 3 days after just traumatised from it all

I suspect its probably a coping mechanism!

But I've had occasions where someone will describe things we have done together or conversations weve had and I have no memory of the person whatsoever!! X

I'm not sure if it's the same but my parents separated quite dramatically when I was 8 and I have no memory of life before that.

I've always found it quite unsettling.

I can’t remember the first time I saw my daughter in NICU. I’m sure I’ve blocked it out !

I don't remember the vast majority of my life before maybe 18.

Wow these are fascinating. Good thread, op.
This is the opposite to false memories, I guess.
It didn't affect me directly, but I don't remember the Chernobyl disaster, which was a huge event, and I was 10, so old enough to take things in.

I don't remember various things. Apparently I bought my younger sister school sports gear (the posh version) because she was being picked on for having the basic one. I've no recollection of it. I know she has a bloody good memory compared to my shit one so I'm just going with it.

I forgot that the doc had time me I had high cholesterol about twelve months prior to him telling me again. It was an online friend who commented on it not going down etc.. I was completely bamboozled and had to do a search to find the posts. How the heck does someone forget something like that.

A friend of mine once said he couldn’t remember anything before the age of 7, I found it surprising because I can remember a few things before that age.
Memory is fascinating! It’s amazing which things mundane things stick and which ones float into the ether. And likewise protecting you by “dropping” particularly traumatic ones.

I don't remember anything at all before 7 and not much between that and 10, my dad died about four months before my tenth birthday so i know why i don't remember, i do wish i could though but try to be at peace with that as i can.

Not quite the same but I was having a scan a few years ago and after a while, the person doing the scan said they couldn't seem to find my left ovary, I then remembered it had been taken out about 22 years previously! I had totally forgotten when they asked for previous medical information.

I can't remember much of my dd's early years. I look at photos and just don't recognise that stage of her life, clothes, places etc. During this time I was beginning to show signs of anxiety and I put it down to this.
I can now watch a film and swear I've never seen it before only to be told I'd watched it previously a couple of months before. OH looks at me like I'm mad.

I remember having a plaster cast when i was in uni. I have no idea why. I definitely had it, i remember being at the hospital and the doctor telling me that it shouldn't be written or drawn on and me thinking I'm definitely going to get my friends to draw on it. I remember it flaking around the edges and feeling quite proud of it. It definitely wasn't a traumatic occasion.

However i have no recollection as to how it happened of even what the injury was, i don't remember it being taken off or who came to the hospital with me. I can't imagine me going alone. I only remembered having a plaster cast by some flashback a few years ago, and I was quite surprised by the memory. It seems like quite a big event to have almost totally forgotten about.

Telling my in laws I was pregnant. I can vividly recall telling my parents, my siblings, DH's aunties and uncles but no recollection whatsoever of telling his parents. Oddly, neither has he!

I don’t remember 9/11. Every year there’s posts all over social media of people (around my age too so I couldn’t have been too young) saying that they can remember exactly where they were and what they were doing when they heard it had happened. I have no recollection of it at all
Other than that I have a really good memory for a lot of things, my earliest memories are from when I was around 2/3 ish

I sometimes worry that I could have blanked out a really traumatic event and I just don't remember it. What if I have some big secret that I've still forgotten.

When I was in my early twenties, I suddenly remembered something (disturbing) that had happened when I was a child (unsure if age but primary). I think I just have blocked it out for years.