What's your earliest memory?

[di]

Don't you look back Wayne and almost feel your parents horror now that you're a parent yourself...I know I often do.
I used to 'run away' when I was that sort of age...I'd pack a suitcase with lots of toys and a few clothes,sneak a few snacks from the kitchen and make it about 20 yards before I got to a road...that was as far as I ever got because I wasn't allowed on the road by myself.

[Florence Fennel]

Strangely one of my earliest memories is of being lost in the Coats & 'Ats Department store in the city centre. I must have been about 4 or 5. I was terrified, but I remember my mum shouting at me when I was found - she must have been terrified too!

[northepaul]

I dont remember anything before 6-7

[VirginVegGrower]

I remember my mum and dad's old three piece suite being delivered as a new purchase. I am told I would have been 18m-2yrs old.

[di]

Not an earliest memory but something similar that confuses me...I can remember all four of our car number plates that we had whilst I was growing up...not got a clue what my current one is and haven't been able to memorise any since being a grown up.

[HeyWayne]

I dont remember anything before 6-7

This morning?

[Helgalush]

Stealing chocolates off the Christmas tree when I thought no-one was looking. From the innocent-looking picture of me with chocolate all round my moosh I would say I was toddler age - 18mths - 2years ish.

[northepaul]

This morning?

NOOO 6-7 YEARS!!

* shakes Head

[Rocketron]

I can remember being held by my auntie in our kitchen, she said to my Mum:"I wonder if mine will be as big as him?".
I was born on May 24th. Her son was born on August 8th.
I have been told that this is impossible, I must have been told about it at a later date.
However, neither of the women remember it.

[reetnproper]

I'm not sure which is my earliest memory but I have two both of which happened when I was about 4 I think:

Emergency landing at some airport or other (Bahrain I think);
Getting pushed off a very tall slide, splitting my head open and spending 2 nights in hospital due to the height of fall and the depth of my cut.

Reet
x

[Aberdeenplotter]

much of my early memories were burned out of my brain with fever when I was in infected with salmonella food poisoning about twenty years ago. . Was a really miserable time.

[HeyWayne]

Don't you look back Wayne and almost feel your parents horror now that you're a parent yourself...I know I often do.

Oh crikey yes. I've a horrible suspicion that Karma will have her way with me at some point and I'll be tearing up the very tarmac we walk on to find him.

[Flummery]

I remember having a dummy dipped in Virol stuff in me mouth when I was in a cot. My Ma says I used to wake up covered in blanket fluff where they'd missed in the night. It's a wonder I have any teeth!

[Bren In Pots]

I remember in my first few weeks at school I got into trouble for squealing when someone threw a Plasticine snake through the Wendy house window.

[snohare]

Pleeeeeease tell me how - it's soooo full of sh!te!

Well, first of all you get the Doctor to lay you on your back, then he lifts your legs...

I find it a fascinating subject, as small children we have a fantastic capacity to absorb new information, but dont seem to remember doing so. Why is this I wonder?

The reason we don't remember everything from day one, is that many of our brains' capabilities develop only after birth, and as comprehension is crucial to memory, a brain that is still learning to recognise the sounds of speech, signals from the visual cortex etc, can't retain details of what seems to be chaotic input. Once we have grown the necessary neurons in whatever part of the brain that is receiving input, our processing power improves, and it's as if we can suddenly focus on the picture of what is happening. Rather like setting up premises in an office block that is still being built, and only doing business once the phones are connected.
The more I learn about neurology, the more gobsmacked I am at how complex our brains are... the only reason we use so small a percentage of our brains at any one time is that every little bit has its own particular function, like remembering how to write your signature or judge the size of something just by eye !
My first memories are of lying in a pram (very vague, I remember an impression of something falling out of it, and being cooed over), and as a toddler, being held in walking reins and running free of my mother's grasp.
Funny that I should have such early memories, since from day one I have had what I call "a pensioner's memory", and suffer all sorts of memory deficits on a daily basis.