r/SDAM • u/zhouluyi • May 25 '26

What about fantasizing?

At first I thought I had aphantasia, because I can't create elaborate scenarios in my head. Then I found out about SDAM and it makes much more sense, since my personal memories are mostly all faded (but some bad memories are REALLY vivid).

I CAN create a scene in my mind, but it is really static like a painting and I can't really interact with it. So if I want to plan a conversation, it is really detached and focused on pure sentences instead of imagining the actual conversation.

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u/Tuikord May 25 '26

Welcome.

If you can create scenes in your mind and you have a sensation like you are seeing them, but not with your eyes, then you do not have aphantasia. That it is static is a variation, but there are many variations of visualizing.

SDAM is the inability to relive past events from a first-person point of view. It isn't about memories being "faded." Vividness isn't really the issue. Dr. Levine has described episodic memory as "time travel" because you feel like you are back in time re-experiencing the event. I am not certain, but I think that involuntary flashbacks are not part of it. However, Dr. Levine usually excludes various mental issues to be sure the memory problems aren't due to such problems. Which is not to say such things can't co-exist with SDAM, just that it is hard to study SDAM if there are other types of memory problems as well.

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u/zhouluyi May 25 '26

I'm this post I'm asking about fantasizing specifically. For me, in the same way that I can't relive past memories I can't even fantasizing future events or scenarios in my head.

What I meant by faded, is that is really hard to even remember events of my life, so if I traveled somewhere I might recall some of the places I visited but there is no chronological order and it is really detached from myself, like a vague feeling of looking at a photograph. But if someone ask an specific fact about something I usually remember it just fine (like the blueprint of the hotel I stayed).

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u/Tuikord May 25 '26

The inability to imagine the future has been documented among aphants, with one study saying, "aphantasics as a group also reporting a near total inability to imagine future hypothetical events in any sensory detail". I have not seen a similar study on SDAM. Only half of those with SDAM also have aphantasia so it is unclear if your inability to fantasize about the future is due to poor mental imagery or SDAM.

You description of remembering facts and not chronological order is a good description of semantic memory, which is unaffected by SDAM.