# What Was Your First Memory?



## debodun (May 11, 2020)

I remember my father giving me a little pair of sunglasses. I have a photo of me wearing them and I was just a baby.


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## hollydolly (May 11, 2020)

I remember being held by my foster mother  and my own mother waving to me from the back window of a retreating Taxi... . when I was 15  I recalled the memory to my mother , she was stunned, because no-one had ever mentioned that first foster home, ..  and as I was only 14 months old, she never thought for a second I would remember it..

My second memory is at that same foster home, where an older boy ( I learned later was just aged 9 ).. was sent upstairs to fetch me from the cot where I was stood crying.. and he dropped me from the top of the stairs to the bottom...


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## debodun (May 11, 2020)

hollydolly said:


> My second memory is at that same foster home, where an older boy ( I learned later was just aged 9 ).. was sent upstairs to fetch me from the cot where I was stood crying.. and he dropped me from the top of the stairs to the bottom...



Express delivery.


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## Aunt Marg (May 11, 2020)

Wow, Deb and Holly!

I remember crying... wailing in fact, laying in a stainless steel crib in a hospital, and the nurse (all dressed in white) was pulling hairpins out of her hair in front of a mirror, and dropping the hairpins into a sink below. 

My mom told me that nothing of the sorts ever happened, but to this day I swear it happened, and I have often wondered if it relates to my first born days. Seems impossible to me to think that a newborn baby could remember (even see) anything, but I know what I witnessed and remember it like yesterday.

It's a memory I've carried with me my entire life.


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## C'est Moi (May 11, 2020)

I have no idea.  I'd never be able to sort out true memories from family stories I've heard and photos I've seen.


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## Gaer (May 11, 2020)

I was a tiny baby, wrapped in a blanket in my Mother's arms.  We were in a car and my Dad was driving.  It was night and we were driving away from Belmont Park in San Diego.  I was lying flat but was kicking and screaming because I wanted to look out the window at the pretty lights of the roller coaster and the ferris wheel.  My Mother didn't know how to shut me up, so my Aunt, in the backseat, said, "I'll take her!"  I was passed to my Aunt who opened the window half way down and stood me up so I could see the lights.  I stopped crying and was so happy!


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## EllisT (May 11, 2020)

My first memory is being stuffed in a clothes hamper by my older brother.


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## win231 (May 11, 2020)

Ice Cream


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## jujube (May 11, 2020)

I remember being at a lake with my parents and my father swimming out into deep water to some sort of structure made of pipes that you could hold onto.  I was holding onto his neck and sort of riding on his back.  I wanted to sit on the pipes but kept falling off.  When we got back to shore, my mother was angry that my father took me out there.

I asked her about it one time and she said I was about 20 months old and couldn't believe I could remember that.  She said she remembered it vividly because she was so angry with my father.


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## Bee (May 11, 2020)

I was born in a public house and my father was a Scotsman and my first memory is of me standing at the end of my cot with my father in the bedroom and me asking for my..... whisky bot bot.


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## Gary O' (May 11, 2020)

*What Was Your First Memory?*


I remember a race...thru a chute
Quite the marathon
There could only be one winner, one survivor

Guess who that was?


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## Fyrefox (May 12, 2020)

I can remember sitting in a wooden chair eating a sandwich on a very rainy day while I watched a cartoon on tv about a tiger.  I was about four at the time, and the multiple sensory inputs of taste, sound, physical sensation, and sight probably served to anchor that experience as my first memory...


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## IrisSenior (May 12, 2020)

A bee in the porch, I was about 3 1/2. I find it hard that people can remember things as a baby.


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## katlupe (May 12, 2020)

I remember being in a crib and my mother coming in to tell me good night. It was dark except for the hall light. She asked me what kind of doll I wanted Santa to bring me (must have been Christmas Eve). I told her a Jeannie doll.


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## Mister E (May 12, 2020)

Falling top to bottom down a flight of stairs  at around age 3 .


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## Lewkat (May 12, 2020)

I was in my high chair and somehow had wiggled enough to stand up and promptly fell out on my head.  I was very small, but don't remember just how old.


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## JaniceM (May 12, 2020)

C'est Moi said:


> I have no idea.  I'd never be able to sort out true memories from _family stories I've heard and photos I've seen_.


That's a very important point everybody should consider.


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## JaniceM (May 12, 2020)

EllisT said:


> My first memory is being stuffed in a clothes hamper by my older brother.


It occurred to me that during the time I lived in my first childhood home, I have numerous memories of neighbors, the neighborhood, things I was doing, etc., but of all my family members the only memory I have is of one of my older brothers and this remote-control robot he owned:  https://www.fastcompany.com/3066169/the-toy-robot-sensation-that-time-forgot
I'd be sauntering along, minding my own business, while he was hiding around the corner.  As soon as he saw me pass the doorway, he had the robot march out, and I'd run screaming- not from fear, but because it was so unexpected.  And then he'd laugh his head off.  I was 2-3 years old.


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## Keesha (May 12, 2020)

I must stop posting stuff that’s depressing.
Deleted.


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## debodun (May 12, 2020)

I heard a psychologist one time on the radio who said that you don't remember anything before the age of 6. I don't believe that. I have plenty of vivid memories of things and events before I was 6. However, I can't remember what I had for dinner last night.


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## fuzzybuddy (May 12, 2020)

I have two. One is laying in my crib, upstairs, listening to the squirrels run around on the roof.  The other was when my dad went into the cellar and left the  cellar door open. I crawled to the top of the steps, and tried to go down them. I remember seeing a light bulb hanging down on a cord. I heard my mom scream, and they came and got me. Also, we lived in the house till I was about 1, but I have a pretty good idea of how the rooms were laid out. It was kind of weird when about 50 years later, my older brother confirmed it.
It's a shame I can remember back so far,. Because that filled up my brain to the point I just don't have any room left to remember new stuff, like where I put my keys.
BTW, debodun, I have vivid memories of when I was 2-5. I don't think that's so unusual.


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## JaniceM (May 12, 2020)

debodun said:


> I heard a psychologist one time on the radio who said that you don't remember anything before the age of 6. I don't believe that. I have plenty of vivid memories of things and events before I was 6. However, I can't remember what I had for dinner last night.


It's just another example of how so-called 'experts' often don't know what they're talking about.  Some of these individuals even say age 7.


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## Gary O' (May 12, 2020)

OK....OK......I've got the one

Sink baths






Oh, and me and playmates…. the chikins
I remember it well (who wouldn't)
Why chikins were in our yard, I have no idea
Maybe dinner close at hand (?)

Anyway, I became a sorta legend amongst native tribes
(I mean, what baby does this?)


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## Aunt Marg (May 12, 2020)

debodun said:


> I heard a psychologist one time on the radio who said that you don't remember anything before the age of 6. I don't believe that. I have plenty of vivid memories of things and events before I was 6. However, I can't remember what I had for dinner last night.


What a shame to know such information is being broadcast so carelessly.

I have a TON of really early memories... memories that go back to when I was in my ones and twos.  

I, 100% remember tossing my baby bottle out of my crib when an aunt was babysitting me, and turning it into a game, with her getting up over and over again to fetch it, and returning it to me, then no sooner she'd sit down in the living room which was within my clear view, I'd toss my bottle onto the floor again.

Vividly remember walking my own wet pants to the diaper pail and dropping them in, with mom supervising me and chastising me over the fact that I wasn't a baby anymore.

Also remember an aunt changing me on the kitchen table. 

All mentioned memories are memories I have from my first childhood home, a home where we moved out of prior to me turning 3, so as for the radio broadcast claiming memories aren't possible before the age of 6, _poppy-cock_, and I have a ton more memories I remember that are tied to my first childhood home.

Pedal cars, taking baths, company visiting, toys I had, a park that I visited and played in the wading pool, and many, many more. Gosh, I could go on and on and on...


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## Aunt Marg (May 12, 2020)

JaniceM said:


> It's just another example of how so-called 'experts' often don't know what they're talking about.  Some of these individuals even say age 7.


Couldn't agree more!


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## Gary O' (May 12, 2020)

debodun said:


> I heard a psychologist one time on the radio who said that you don't remember anything before the age of 6. I don't believe that. I have plenty of vivid memories of things and events before I was 6.






JaniceM said:


> It's just another example of how so-called 'experts' often don't know what they're talking about. Some of these individuals even say age 7.



Maybe they meant after.....and dropped the zero


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## Sassycakes (May 12, 2020)

*I have a memory from when I was 4yrs old. My Grandmother passed away in the beginning of December. My Mom said we would not be having Christmas that year. She wouldn't let my Dad decorate the house or even put a Christmas tree up. She also said Santa wouldn't be coming that year.When me and my 6yr old sister woke up Christmas morning and went downstairs there were 2 wicker baskets with a doll in each one.
One for my sister and one for me.My Dad couldn't stand the thought of me and my sister not getting something from Santa. I still have the doll and so does my sister*.


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## Pecos (May 12, 2020)

My earliest vivid memory is the flower bed in Grandfather's front yard. He loved colorful pansies. 
I look at old photos of me as a child and think: no that couldn't have been me in those goofy short pants with suspenders.


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## debodun (May 12, 2020)

Sassycakes said:


> *I have a memory from when I was 4yrs old. My Grandmother passed away in the beginning of December. My Mom said we would not be having Christmas that year. She wouldn't let my Dad decorate the house or even put a Christmas tree up. She also said Santa wouldn't be coming that year.When me and my 6yr old sister woke up Christmas morning and went downstairs there were 2 wicker baskets with a doll in each one.
> One for my sister and one for me.My Dad couldn't stand the thought of me and my sister not getting something from Santa. I still have the doll and so does my sister*.


View attachment 104126


I don't believe parents should foist their grief on their children. Your dad was an angel.


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## hollydolly (May 12, 2020)

debodun said:


> I heard a psychologist one time on the radio who said that you don't remember anything before the age of 6. I don't believe that. I have plenty of vivid memories of things and events before I was 6. However, I can't remember what I had for dinner last night.


 absolutely untrue... as I said it had never been discussed in out family ( who btw were expert secret keepers)... that I'd been in that first foster home ( subsequent ones couldn't be hidden because I was older )... but that first one was never mentioned, and I held that memory fairly frsh in my mind until one day mentioned it to my mum...  I can still see her wide eyed look as I told her,  at the fact I had memory of it , and she told me that she didn't think I could possibly have memory of it because I was just 14 months old, but clearly I had...


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## Aneeda72 (May 12, 2020)

My earliest memory is in a moving van.  Moving from Kansas to California with mom, dad, brother, and grandma.  We were all stuffed in the cab.


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## gennie (May 12, 2020)

Deeply personal events of abuse.  I can avoid thinking of them but cannot forget.


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## Aneeda72 (May 12, 2020)

gennie said:


> Deeply personal events of abuse.  I can avoid thinking of them but cannot forget.


Yes, a few of us have memories of abuse, or, no young memories at all due to abuse.  I have no memories before the move where I was 4/5.  I have a few family stories, a few pictures, but my mind is a blank of those early years.  Probably for the best.


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## Aunt Marg (May 12, 2020)

EllisT said:


> My first memory is being stuffed in a clothes hamper by my older brother.


Thank goodness you didn't make it into the washing machine!


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## debodun (May 12, 2020)




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## peppermint (May 12, 2020)

I don't remember anything....The only thing, I remember, my mom showed me a picture when I was older, I was playing on our porch and
I fell down the steps....She said she took me to the hospital...
I do remember my first day of school...I was 5 years old....(I forget names, now, at my age)….


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## OneEyedDiva (May 12, 2020)

I can't remember.


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## Capt Lightning (May 14, 2020)

I was in a cot and a nurse and doctor were standing over me and examining my chest.  For years I wondered why I have a small scar in my chest and one day my mother said that I was born with a cyst there which was removed when I was a baby. 

I also remember being in a pram and my brother hanging onto the handle.  My mother told him to be careful and not cowp it.  (cowp  - a Scottish term meaning to overturn  /  knock over)


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## Sassycakes (May 14, 2020)

debodun said:


> View attachment 104126
> 
> 
> I don't believe parents should foist their grief on their children. Your dad was an angel.



*debodun you are right ,my Dad was truly an angel. The thing he showed our family was true love. His family meant the world to him. My Dad passed away when my son was in his early 20's and it took him 5yrs to mention my Dad because he as a wonderful Granddad to my son and all the grandchildren.*


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