What if I Don’t Remember
- Matthew Dean
- 2 hours ago
- 4 min read
Some of us have lives that are filled with stories of overt harm. We might call these “big T Traumas”. These are stories where our sense of self, safety, and autonomy were threatened, creating a lingering adverse effect. The details of these stories are often easy to remember because they were or are so distressing.
Others of us have stories with more covert harm, meaning the harm was not as obvious. Collectively, these stories can lead to "little t traumas”. For example, say you were told to “shut up” at school. If this happened to you once, you might have been able to not let it sink in as a core belief. But, if this was something you were told by your parents over and over again, you may have developed a belief that the voice doesn’t matter. While one event may not have led to a lasting a trauma, a collection of events did. Even more covert, you may never have been physically hit by a caretaker. But were you hugged? The absence of good can often be just as if not more impactful than the presence of harm. Even if you had the basic needs of food, water, and shelter, you may not have been connected to. The pain of your story being that your heart was left undiscovered by the people who were closest to you. This leads us to the purpose of this blog: remembering.
It is a normal phenomenon to have clients report negative core beliefs, distressing symptoms like anxiety or depression, or have hypervigilance but have a hard time understanding why, saying:
“Nothing bad happened to me growing up”
“It wasn’t THAT bad.
“Others had it way worse than I had it.”
“That’s just the way it was.”
Sitting with the details of your story can be a challenge if you’ve not spent time in the practice of remembering. Perhaps you’ve actually spent effort trying to forget. For many of us, creating distance from pain is an adaptive and protective measure…until it is not. You may have a hard time remembering because there was nothing good or bad to remember. You grew up without overt harm, but you also grew up without overt connection and good.
Distressing symptoms (anxiety, depression, stress) often means there are distressing stories in our past. While remembering is a goal, it is not the final step. We remember so that we can offer kindness, curiosity, and care to the version of ourselves that experienced harm. It’s not masochism, it’s inviting the opportunity for compassion. For today, we will focus on ways to bring to mind our stories.
What follows are some ways to begin the practice of remembering.
Smell
Senses help us remember, especially the sense of smell. Try cooking your favorite family recipe. Light a candle that reminds you of your family holiday. Wash your clothes with the same detergent you had growing up. As you do these things, pay attention to the memories that come up and what your body has to say about these stories.
Visit your home town
Take a trip to visit your home town with the purpose of welcoming whatever comes up. Drive past your house, school, playground, and any other places you spent meaningful time. Spend some time in silence noticing how your body responds to being in these places. See if certain memories come up for you.
Write down family lore
What are the stories that your family loves to tell? After identifying them, pay attention to the way they are told. Consider the following phrases:
“She was a drama queen”
“You ALWAYS threw a temper tantrum”
“I was so proud of him for not crying”
Phrases like these can give clues to the environment you grew up in. Be curious about the implication of the stories your family remembers.
Talk to your siblings, cousins, our childhood friends
Ask these people what they remember from your growing up years. The stories you remember may be different from the stories others remember.
Look at old pictures
Pay attention to your face in old pictures. Who is notably always there or always missing? What feelings do you have towards that younger version of you? Are you more critical or more kind towards your younger self?
As you begin to remember, be careful not to minimize the stories that come up. If you remember, you are remembering for a reason. Do not dismiss them as “no big deal”.
The next step after bringing to mind these images, feelings, and stories is to write them down. Write as if you were an author creating a world for the reader. Paint scenes with as much detail as you can (Ex: I felt the hot sun on my skin as I waited eagerly for my dad to join me at the beach).
If writing a story from memory feels difficult, here are some additional writing prompts that may be helpful as a way to journal or create story:
Name an important person from your childhood. How did they treat you? How did you feel around them?
What is a birthday that you remember? Who was there? Were you celebrated? What was that like for you?
If you traveled as a family, what was it like for you?
How did you learn about sex? What was it like to talk about it?
What did you do when you got home from school? Was anyone else around?
Choose 3 adjectives to describe each of your primary caretakers. Write about why you chose those words. Write a story that’s an example of one of the words.
Divide your life into chapters. Write a synopsis of each chapter. Consider what the important stories of each chapter are.
Remember, kindness and curiosity are imperative in healing. Replacing judgment with curiosity can give you the space for old versions of yourself to grieve, process, and heal.
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