Amnesia/Memory Recall of Pre-Trauma Childhood

[afterandalasia]

Hello again, little-details. It's been a while (and a change of name) since I posted here, so hopefully I'm getting this right.

Setting: A mash-up historical period, with some elements from later Medieval and some post-Medieval, vaguely Scandinavian in feel, with magic in existence but very rare (other than the abundant presence of dragons). (For

Comments

[lanalucy]

I can only speak to the first one. This is my personal experience, not research. I have virtually NO memories before three weeks past my eight birthday

[afterandalasia]

Thank you so much for sharing this. That's actually great for what I'm after here, which is basically not really knowing who she is until she gets confronted with it. You're a star.

[lanalucy]

Yay! Nice to know my past is good for something. lol

[kdorian]

Personal experience - I don't remember much of anything from my childhood; I doubt I would recognize my best friends from grade school with any more than vague familiarity if I saw a picture of them then, and would not have any idea who they were if they came up to me and introduced themselves now

[afterandalasia]

Ooh, this is great, and you have an excellent point that she might not recognise the palace from the outside because she's so used to being inside. Thinking back, the houses in which I lived until I was six are, yeah, pretty vague. I remember the bathroom of one from the night that I had terrible food poisoning, but that's about it.

Thanks for this!

[afterandalasia]

Ooh, that's really interesting, actually. Good to know!

[learnsslowly]

I think there must be quite a wide range of possible answers here, so you might be able to choose what fits your story best. My earliest recollection was seeing my baby brother for the first time when I was nearly two, and being unable to find the words to ask why my mother didn't seem upset that the hospital people had given her a baby with no hair who couldn't even sit up. I had also noticed that she had a box of "grown-up sweeties" and hoping she would give me one. Emotionally important but not traumatic, which I think is how it stuck

[afterandalasia]

Apologies for the delay in replying. I suspected there would be a range of answers, and while it seemed possible to me I sort of wanted to check if it passed muster with others (and see if there was anyone who had more knowledge of this as an academic area, I suppose, who could weigh in

[afterandalasia]

Sorry for the delay in replying, and thanks for your input!

As you say, it looks like there is some range, and for the sake of storytelling it looks like I'm going to have to lean to the 'less memory' side of things.

Oddly, it's no problem that she rememebrs living in the castle - people would just guess that she was a servant, because obviously there are a lot of servants but only two princesses.