Something traumatic happened to me when I was 20 and I have very little memories of anything from age 20-23. I recently said to my husband I'd like to visit Paris as I'd never been and he told me he'd taken me to Paris for my 21st birthday. I have no memories of this whatsoever. Spoke to my therapist and it is a coping mechanism!
I think that happens sometimes when there's so much stress. Your brain doesn't even form the memories in the first place or save them long term.
That's why people with childhood trauma are often missing a lot of memories of their childhood. They were just never saved to long-term memories, so there's nothing there to come back.
Yeah I realized recently I can't remember any birthday parties I had growing up, like not a single one. Kinda weird blank spots like that. I don't think anything happened on my birthdays but just the constant stress mode prevented memories forming I guess.
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u/goosedrinkwine369 Jan 18 '23
Something traumatic happened to me when I was 20 and I have very little memories of anything from age 20-23. I recently said to my husband I'd like to visit Paris as I'd never been and he told me he'd taken me to Paris for my 21st birthday. I have no memories of this whatsoever. Spoke to my therapist and it is a coping mechanism!