Do you remember being a child?

[Eatyourbanana]

I have absolutely no memories until the age of about 9 or 10. Even memories I have of that age are few and far between.

My nan always tells me stories of ‘when I was 3 my mum blah blah...’ she thinks there’s something wrong with me I don’t remember anything?!

YABU - I have memories from a young age 3,4,5...

YANBU - I cant remember much, if anything from childhood.

Not really an AIBU, but generally intrigued.

I have had someone seriously argue with me that they remember being born, so there’s always that...

😂

Stupid voting options - it's not 3,4,5 or nothing

A few memories from when I was two but they are just fragments. A lot more and more detailed from 3/4.

I have a very clear memory of my second birthday, I was hiding under the dining table because the house was filled with people. Can't say I've changed much

I remember my younger sister as a baby, so when I was around 20 months. I definitely remember my 2nd birthday.

When I was a teenager we went to a beach, and I remembered it vividly. My parents told me that it was the first time I'd seen the sea - at 18 months.

I have a lot of memories of childhood, from quite a young age. Not just events either, but vivid memories of thoughts, feelings and emotions. I find I can empathise quite well with children, maybe because I remember so much of it so clearly.

I have a lot of blanks from my early to mid 20s though - went through some traumatic things and I think I’ve suppressed a lot of it. People, places, events.

My earlier memory I was running after my mum and sister in an airport carrying a huge teddy bear. According to my older sister I was around 3 that holiday. I dont remember much just a few vivid memories but I had quite an abusive childhood so my brain may have skipped over alot.

I remember my grandfather dying when I was 16 months old.

Nope. I remember very little. Even of adult life. I have a friend that remembers every wedding, 21st, 30th, 40th birthday parties etc. I remember nothing.

Look at Clark Baim's adult model of attachment. It gives a good explanation into why some, like you and I, struggle with memory.

Strangely I was thinking about my childhood earlier today and I reflected that the people who were in those memories with me are now either dead or nc. So sad. Interesting thread.

Yes I have quite a lot, playing with my friends, a holiday abroad, starting school, birthday parties, dance shows etc etc. Some are more vivid than others right enough.

I have one memory before the age of 5 - in nursery looking at an incubator of little yellow chicks. I remember my first day of school where the teacher pulled a screaming boy into the classroom and he banged his head off the wall. I can recall maybe around 10-15 memories before the age of 7. However I did have an abusive childhood so that may be why. Or maybe those level of memories of early childhood are normal, I don't know.

I have very clear memories from about the age of 4. Happy,stable childhood. My husband has no real memories from childhood, and I've come to believe his was quite traumatic (don't know as he can't remember) - it definitely included a painful divorce, and both his parents are problematic (mother very cold, unsubstantiated accusations of previous violence about his dad)

I have lots of individual memories that start from around aged 2, but they are isolated and disjointed. There is no flow or order to them and I couldn't line them up choronogially.

I would be able to tell you about lots of 'things' that happened and describe people/places/days out/moments in time, and I could share fleeting pictures - a moment on a boating lake, a dress in a fancy dress box etc but I wouldn't be able to tell you how old I was (without any context e.g. Nursery school etc).

I envy people who have really vivid and coherent memories.

Very clear memories here. There earliest being pushed down the street by my lovely late DM whilst in my Ginormous Black Silver Cross pram.

My 2 elder Dsis's were holding onto the side of it and I can see all of their faces.

@Hingeandbracket, sorry. Where do you fit in between?

I had a serious accident just before I turned three and remember it and the aftermath in a huge amount of detail, my mum got really freaked out my how accurately I described it as an adult!. I also have snippets of various memories throughout my early childhood, often of events that to a small child would have seemed significant (even though they really aren’t!)

Very few memories before age 14, until my sisters filled me in - and I kept diaries - but they are mainly stuff I remember. Or maybe I only remember what I read? I only remembered holidays and Christmases until I raised how my mother abused us to my sisters. I then remembered things the told me had happened.

In my case I was dissociated due to abuse. Hope that's not true for you OP.

I do, mostly of my nana and some of my first school. My nana died when I was 6 so those memories are treasured I have memories of her from at least as young as 3.
I also remember pooing myself in nursery 😂

I see a lot of people who remember things remembering injustices or minor bad things... though there have been some lovely ones to!

Love the one being in the pram & 2 older sisters holding the sides

Oh. but I do have a flash of walking down our garden path, and my height means I must have been a toddler.

My memory is like a video tape, and I rewind to the bits I want to look at. The earliest I can get to is about 18mo or so, just before my brother was born, but I don't remember my mother being pregnant with him.

I had a very unhappy childhood, pretty abusive tbh, but remember good and bad and plain ordinary things alike. I remember more about my childhood than I do from the last ten years. I can still recall whole lessons from primary and secondary school.

I remember moving house at 2yo and my first playschool, falling into a hedge as a stupid car pushed mum's bicycle off the road, an earwig infestation we had one summer, including one finding its way into my medicine bottle

Then lots and lots of lovely memories until 9yo. 9-11 sketchy (we moved a lot, I went to 5 different schools), I don't remember classmates' names, or teachers.

DH doesn't remember anything before about 7yo, had a fab bohemian childhood, lots of siblings and cousins, lots of crazy aunt and uncle stories, lots of trouble-making!

I'm pretty sure I remember rolling down a hill when I was two, although there are photos of that.

I definitely remember being 3. I remember the hotel roon with the bay window, bunk beds and being sick on holiday. I also remember seeing the younger puppies on the day we got the dog and lots of memories of the dog being young.

I moved house/ area at 7 and that's bee quite useful at identifying menories before 7.

DH doesn't remember much of his childhood. There's an annual set of photos from the sibling being confirmed that year and not many others, and it sounds a very himdrum childhood with little out of routine to be memorable. Holidays were just a caravan an hour's drive along the coast in the same county.

DCs have my memory. DS1 insisted that he had been on a canal barge... it was on a brownie trip when he was 2 or 3 at a living museum and I'd forgotten that. He also talks about the jeep ride when he was 3 although there are photos to jog his memory.

Alas both DCs also have my terrible memory for prosaic stuff like "why did I come upstairs" (DS1 has diagnoses of dyslexia and dyspraxia which affect working memory, and I suspect I may have dyspraxia too)

You know I just don’t know @ChristmasFluff! I didn’t have the best childhood, that I know. But I can’t pin point any one thing being significantly traumatic. Maybe I just have a bloody terrible memory!

But then, the things I do remember from being older are mostly bad things, so surely I would remember bad things from younger childhood too?

Sorry you had a hard time