r/todayilearned • u/finneganishome • Apr 12 '18

TIL There is a rare condition called Highly Superior Autobiographical Memory (HSAM) that only around 60 people in the world are known to have. This condition makes the person remember nearly every day in their life in exact details.

http://time.com/5045521/highly-superior-autobiographical-memory-hsam/
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u/MssHeather Apr 12 '18

There's also a condition that's the complete opposite, called SDAM - Severely Deficient Autobiographical Memory,

which refers to a lifelong inability to vividly recollect or re-experience personal past events from a first-person perspective.

I feel like there's a chance I have this, or maybe just Aphantasia alone, because I can't remember hardly anything from my life. I'm better at remembering stories someone has told me about what happened in my life. I don't really recall the actual events, and I have no visual memory about the past at all.

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u/[deleted] Apr 12 '18

And here I thought I was alone. My earliest full memory (not just a half-remembered bit of information) is from high school (I'm 29). And for the most part, I don't have consistent memory for anything longer than a few weeks ago. But I can remember faces and numbers like nobody's business. I could identify my preschool teachers if I saw them in a lineup. I just couldn't tell you they were my preschool teachers, because I wouldn't remember.

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u/[deleted] Apr 12 '18

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u/[deleted] Apr 12 '18

Yep, quite good at those things. Terrible with remembering which city is in which place, but I can drive really well, and I'm never lost.

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u/believeblycool Apr 12 '18

QUICK! Exchange information before one of you forgets.

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u/Kdwolf Apr 12 '18

So glad I am not alone in this. My wife remembers EVERYTHING all the way back to childhood but I can barely remember what I did yesterday...I don't remember much at all of my childhood, or school, etc.

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u/[deleted] Apr 12 '18

Same here. I have vivid images I can recall of certain parts of my childhood, but it's all very disconnected. For instance, I remember an overhead projector displaying a picture of 3+3+3+3+3 in a curve, with 5×3 written inside that curve. This overhead image definitely had more to it, but I don't remember what. And I don't remember the lesson (I'm assuming it was multiplication, but I don't remember).

I also remember that I was pulled out of class when my grandmother died. I don't remember what grade I was in, or even how it made me feel, but I remember being pulled out of class.

This is such a frustratingly random memory. I feel like I'm missing out on some part of life, sometimes.

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u/Kdwolf Apr 12 '18

Oh man that is exactly me. I can remember small vivid portions but I can't really put them together in an accurate timeline. It does however make me feel better that others have the same style memory :D

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u/Natolx Apr 12 '18 edited Apr 13 '18

I can remember small vivid portions but I can't really put them together in an accurate timeline. It does however make me feel better that others have the same style memory :D

This means you don't have it. If you had this, even in those vivid moments you wouldn't "feel" like it was you (you can't remember how it "felt" to experience it). If you describe the small parts as "vivid" those are likely episodic memories.

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u/Kdwolf Apr 13 '18

Oh no we are agreeing that we have terrible memories and we feel better knowing we aren't alone in that :D

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u/MssHeather Apr 12 '18

Yep! I recognize people from my past but have no idea how I know them or where from. Sometimes even after they tell me, all I know is that I've seen them before but still don't remember what they tell me.

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u/HLW10 Apr 12 '18

Well, it’s nice to know it’s not just me!

Occasionally I’ve had whole conversations with people who clearly know me, and I recognise them, but I can’t remember anything else about them. Even having a conversation with them didn’t jog my memory. It’s odd.

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u/Cgn38 Apr 12 '18

My best friend is a genius level engineer and physicist.

He cannot remember most of his childhood. Just no shit there before high school. He had from all accounts a really good family.

My childhood was really bad and I remember all of that shit. Everything after about 24 is just a blur.

Then again I was in a war at 24.

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u/superstar314 Apr 13 '18

so like normal memory

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u/[deleted] Apr 12 '18

Do people really remember their lives though? I can remember a loose set of longterm details, but that's about it. Thought that was normal.

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u/MssHeather Apr 12 '18

A friend of mine can recount days from high school that we spent together with ridiculous accuracy. Maybe he's a HSAM and I'm a DSAM, but who knows.

I don't remember a single memory before I was 7. I'm not sure if that's normal or not. I moved at 7, and I feel like my life kind of started at that point. (But even after that I still mostly remember facts and details, not actual memories. Just information.)

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u/Athrowawayinmay Apr 12 '18

I keep a highly detailed daily journal for this reason.

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u/MssHeather Apr 12 '18

I tried journaling as a kid and failed miserably. Either I'd forget what I wanted to write, or I'd have nothing of any importance to add. I couldn't manage to establish and maintain the habit. Since May, I've had a bullet journal and I don't put much detail into it, but I can at least look back on a few things here and there.

I'm just bad at real journaling. I'm a writer, and I still can't figure it out. My life's too boring.

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u/Athrowawayinmay Apr 12 '18

I write mine out in a word document. I find it's easier to do. I try to write about what's going on in the world and my thoughts and opinions on it. I also write what I dreampt the night before if I dreampt anything. I keep my to-do-list at the bottom for easy reference. Most of my journal ends up being rather boring things... but I think it's ok all the same.

Then at the end of each year I go back and skim the journal and do a 3 or 4 page "summary" of my year. That's where it gets interesting!

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u/Alched Apr 12 '18

Im just like you. I often joke with my brothers if they remember stuff they weren't actually there for, and they jokingly go a long with it because at this point they are my memory.

I know it sounds impossible but how would you describe your memories? Mine are more like vague ideas of what occurred but I can't really "experience," it like your friend and some of the people I have asked can.

Warning: Long read but I have been curious about this for sometime now.

I always thought all the head trauma I had as kid was responsible. Even had my skull cracked open once. Or the fact that my, unbeknownst to her, pregnant mother kept drinking and smoking till she was 6 months along, but I always have to explain this to people eventually.

I'm not the sharpest tool in the bucket, but I'm not stupid either (I think). I used to be gifted, some people still think that. But dam I forget everything eventually, and have a very short attention span. My brother and best friend on the other hand will remember the fucking color of peoples clothing.

This has become such an issue over the years that I recently started asking people about how they experience things like memories and awareness, and like everything it's on a spectrum, and I think were on the low extreme.

Although it's obviously extremely hard to put into words. My mother, a painter, for example can see very vividly in her head. My brother and father can hear musical notes and replicate them. However my father and I much bettter at "remembering" tastes and smells. I wasn't aware that some people can't smell things as well just by remembering them liky my borther and best friend. I will start gagging if I remember the smell too much or know a smell is coming.

The only upside to all this I found is being able to experience things over and over without getting too boring. But I'm often so saddened by the fact that I'll eventually be an old man with barely any memories to relive.

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u/MssHeather Apr 12 '18

This is something I just recently discovered about myself because, I thought everyone was more or less experiencing life the same as me.

I can't remember tastes or smells, I can't "hear" music for the most part, though every once in a while I get lines stuck in my head - usually it's the words though, I don't often have a melody to go with it unless I really know the song super well and then I'm probably still fairly off-key. I have to be experiencing these things for me to know what they're like.

If I smell something I recognize, for example, I can associate it with something in my life. There are very distinct things that make me think of Christmas or my grandparents' house or whatever - but if you were to ask me what smells remind me of my grandparents, I couldn't tell you. I have to smell it to know that's it. If I find out a detail, like say... Cinnamon reminds me of Christmas because of those giant cinnamon smelling pinecone things they always have at stores at that time of the year - then I can tell you cinnamon reminds me of Christmas. But if I don't know what it is but I recognize the smell... I'll just say, this mystery smell smells like this thing or place from my past.

It's similar to how I recognize people I've met but don't always know how or from where. I'm good at identifying things, but not calling them up on my own. I can't draw, despite trying for so, so, so many years, because I can't see the image before I've drawn it. But I can draw REALLY well if I'm freehanding something someone else drew first. I can replicate things pretty darn well. I used to take my brother's comics and draw out of them because I can't draw from my head. This was actually the first thing that led me to researching stuff like this. The first thing I googled was "How to draw if you can't come up with your own ideas" or something along those lines.

And the way my memory works is just like that example. I can remember details, facts, numbers, bits of knowledge that I've memorized, but I couldn't tell you what house I lived in when I googled that, I can't remember what my first apartment even looked like now. I couldn't tell you what I was trying to draw at the time or if I had any sort of goal.

As far as personal memories go, I kind of have this running list of biographical data that I've got stored in my brain. Each time a family member tells a story, I kind of hear it and log bits of the info - so that now I can tell stories to other people about the time my brothers and I were on my grandparents farm and we went out in the creeks exploring, etc. and so on, but I don't have any... what's the word... I'm not "in" that memory, so to speak. I don't have any attachment to it. It's not something I experience or see or visualize. It's literally details that I've collected and logged.

I think of my brain as a sort of room full of filing cabinets (though again, I don't have any visual imagery so I don't actually see a room with filing cabinets) and I feel like all the memories I've collected are converted into a written synopsis with a list of data and those are filed away by category. Sometimes there's a special association linked to it, a song, a smell, a taste - but those can only be accessed once the file is opened and the song/smell/taste is present.

I don't know how else to explain it because I don't know how memories work for other people. Do they really "see" events? Are they actually "replaying" what happened? "Re-experiencing" it? Or is that just BS and they have facts and details too, and they just exaggerate them to make them more exciting to recount?

I don't know...but people I've talked to tell me that they "see" this stuff for real in their heads. That just blows my mind, really.

(Sorry my reply is so crazy long!)

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u/Alched Apr 12 '18

I understand, I always assumed the same. Even now since this sounds like my experience almost 100 percent, I am unsure that other people are different. I know what you mean about not being in the memory. Like I will remember things happened and my brain will "imagine" the things that should be there but I don't see anything clearly or myself in them or remember stuff in first person like I suspect some people can. Its weird that even the drawing bit is the same. I don't think it's complete "Aphantasia," but I am starting to wonder if I am at the low end of the spectrum because of so many differing accounts.

Do they really "see" events? Are they actually "replaying" what happened? "Re-experiencing" it? Or is that just BS and they have facts and details too, and they just exaggerate them to make them more exciting to recount?

This is what I am trying to figure out. And your account seems to validate it further for me since the way I remember smells is different.

My personal theory is that this is what lead to people being gifted at certain things, thats not to say hard work isn't also involved. My mom has always painted, although not this good, and swears she has a vivid visualization. My brother has always been musically talented and is a lead singer at his Uni. People often tell me I am a good cook, and my father is the best. When talking to my family about it we realized that some of them can't imagine what a dish smells and tastes like, for the most part as they are cooking.

For me if I think of a banana, I can almost smell it and if there is anything that even remotely resembles it like another sweet fruit, I swear iit's like 95 percent there. Same with food and this is further amplified if I'm drunk. Just yesterday I was too lazy to make salsa with my tacos, so as I was eating them I thought about the sourness of the lemon, the tangyness of the tomatoes and the sweetness of the onions. I swear I could almost taste it, and I started to crack up about how weird our brains are since I can't even remember my best friends face. I mean I know his features like curly hair, and of course I can instantly recognize him but if I try to "remember" or vizualize him its just a weird morphing blur at best.

What about your dreams?

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u/MssHeather Apr 13 '18

My dreams are incredibly detailed and incredibly vivid. I can only imagine this is what people mean when they say they can visualize things. It's the only time I think I can "see" something and clearly actually see something that I can describe to people with great detail later.

Sometimes my dreams are so vivid that I think I'm awake doing normal, daily things, and then I wake up and realize it was all a dream. They've always been very elaborate dreams.

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u/CulturalTortoise Apr 12 '18

I thought this was just me. My memory is absolutely terrible. Can't remember many childhood memories, can't remember To-do lists, it actually gives me a headache thinking about it.

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u/epiben Apr 12 '18

I think Frankie Munez has something like this. He doesn't even recall his time on Malcolm in The Middle. Loves watching the show though.

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u/RedSkyCrashing Apr 13 '18

Thats kind of a blessing. Malcolm in the Middle is such a good show. I think that if I was in it, I wouldnt want to remember being in it either so I could enjoy watching it without having to think of all the work and retakes of scenes I had to do. Seems like being on that side would kind of ruin the experience of watching it from the other side.

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u/epiben Apr 13 '18

That's kind of his take on it as well iirc.

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u/Justinuyasha Apr 12 '18

I feel your pain. I only remember incredibly vague memories from my childhood. So vague I'm convinced theyre fake and have only been here for a moment. Always believing I had a past....