A Game of Memory

I have a preoccupation with memory.

I have vivid memories before the age of 7 and after the age of about 20, but in between blank spaces exist. Emotions without pictures, sensations without words. There also exist specific memories heightened by specific dialogue, setting and startling visuals. Visuals that I sometimes dream about to this day. They would derail my sleep and transport me through time like a masochistic time traveler.

“Again to the painful thing. Only the painful thing. Yes. More. Please.”

During the day, I’d pretend these memories didn’t exist and even if they did exist they really didn’t effect my every day life because I did well in school without much effort (until I didn’t), I was responsible and dependable (until I wasn’t), I could work hard (until I couldn’t), I was confident and self-assured (but not really).

I remember my mom telling me my birth story. I call her Mama Bear in my stories because it seems to fit her. She was pregnant at 19 years old. She craved Twix. She liked watching Hart to Hart on television. In fact, I was named after her favorite character. She’d only been married 6 months when she went into labor on a cold day in February. The poor woman was in labor for three days. 72 hours later when I just did not show up, one of her doctors finally thought,

“Hmm, perhaps this isn’t going to happen the way we want it to happen?” and rolled her into the OR for an emergency C-section.

It was an emergency because my umbilical cord was wrapped around my neck.

It was an emergency because I was swimming in my own shit.

This was strange foreshadowing.

Mama bear kept me alive for three days. I remember this story vividly. Every few years, I learn a new detail. I add it to the lore of my birth. Life tried to take me out early. I wonder on the difficult days if there was any damage.

As I child I was very bright. “Capricious” my grandpa used to say with a glint in his eye. I think he liked that about me. He liked that I liked to learn new things just because. He liked that I would tell him about it with so much excitement and wonder. Everything fascinated me as a child. In kindergarten, I was a trivia sponge.

Did you know the human head weight eight pounds?

Did you know the number one followed by a hundred zeros is called a googleplex?

Did you know bees and dogs smell fear?

And elephants cry?

And we are related to apes, not monkeys, but apes?

Any new pieces of information I learned I would talk about. Apparently ad nauseam because I distinctly remember one of my aunts saying, “Does Jennifer ever shut up?”

I used to watch ABC Nightly News with Peter Jennings every night. I did not have a particular interest in the news, but it’s what my parents were watching, and I really didn’t have a say in what we watched back then. But I absorbed a lot. I had a rudimentary understanding of Cold War politics. I knew the major players. I got the gist of the conflict. Something about nuclear weapons and who had the biggest, the best and the most. I could point out Mikhail Gorbachev in a line up. My kindergarten teacher didn’t understand how I could even clearly say “Gorbachev” let alone understand what the Cold War was about.

“My parents make me watch the news.” I explained, very confused why she was confused.

She was baffled how a young Black child of Haitian immigrants knew such things. I remember her talking to my mother about it. My mother told her the same thing I did, “She watches the news with us every night.”

“Well, she is just so bright,” she says with surprise.

I kind of became teacher’s pet after that. My teacher would point out to the whole class whenever I did something she thought was remarkable. It made uncomfortable although I couldn’t explain why. Why were adult so surprised by me? I didn’t get it.

I was an avid reader. I had a book-a-day habit for a while there. I would stay up late to finish a book. I would go through a series in a few days. I was assigned summer reading in middle and high school, and inevitably I’d leave it until the last minute and read all 7 books and complete their respective book reports in a week. I always ruined the curve in my high school chemistry class because I could see the molecules in my head. I could not look people in the eye. It was far, far too unnerving.

I would shiver randomly. I had a restless leg, but only during tests. Some times words just stopped making sense when people talked to me. Con-science? I would nod like I had heard and understood what they said but I didn’t. I didn’t study until junior year in undergrad, and by then I had no idea how. I was highly sensitive and empathic. I could put myself in other people’s shoes. I could feel their hurt. I would try to fix it. People took advantage of that. I understood the thought processes behind other people actions and reactions and extended grace for them, perhaps far too much grace, but I’d feel a level of distance. Like I was learning about a different animal species. I could tell you a lot of information about this species but could not fundamentally relate because a lot of behavior didn’t make sense to me, instinctually, emotionally even spiritually.

I didn’t understand how to human the way people were pushing to me to be human.

My grandpa died several years ago. He had severe dementia when he passed. It had gotten to the point were he stopped speaking English. He used to be fluent. He would sing to himself when he got confused. Or he would get violent. I knew he didn’t have an easy life. I knew he didn’t make life easy for his children but he was one of the biggest male influences in my life and I loved him a lot. My last memory of him was a visit to his assisted living facility. He was far gone by this time, not even speaking much. I remember staring into his eyes. This is not something I would normally do. But I searched his eyes. I looked for him. I thought, for the briefest of moments, I caught a glimpse of him. He smiled at me like I was someone he used to know. And then it was gone. And then he was gone.

I started therapy at 37. I was terrified for a long time of talking to a stranger about my life. She asked me why I was here. I told her I was abused as a child. I told her I’m ready to admit that it has impacted my entire life. I told her it almost broke me once. I told her I’m afraid that I am crazy. That I am broken beyond repair. She took a moment to respond, considering what I told her. She tells me,

“I think you have incredible instincts about yourself. I am so sorry for all that you have been through. I don’t think you are crazy or broken beyond repair. I think you had natural reactions to the environment you lived in. You survived. And now you are ready to thrive.”

I remember I felt acknowledged, validated, and understood.

She explained how EMDR worked. She explained that it would put my memories in the correct places in my brain, so that they would actually start to feel distant. She asked me for my targets, explaining that there is usually a main target, a linchpin memory that once reprocessed will unravel most, if not all, the trauma.

I was honest with her. I told her about the blank spaces.

She explained to me that it was okay. That my brain was trying to protect me. That my brain held the memories intact away from my consciousness.

I must have looked skeptical because she told me to read a book, The Body Keeps The Score by Bessel Van Der Kolk, MD.

She warned me it might be dense.

I got through it in 4 days.

It was eye-opening to have in the palm of my hand the language to name what was going on in my head.

Depersonalization. Developmental Trauma Disorder. Posttraumatic Spectrum Symptoms.

“…we had visual proof that the effects of trauma are not necessarily different from - and can overlap with - the effect of physical lesions like strokes.”

Something seemed off though. I could have been a statistic. By all conventional wisdom, I should have been a statistic. But I wasn’t. I graduated from a prestigious college preparatory program. I got a full scholarship to university. I graduated from a rigorous professional program. I wasn’t addicted to anything. I wasn’t engaging in risky behavior. I was a productive member of society, wasn’t I?

I sat with this for a while. I cried for a longer while.

If my brain was broken, how am I here? I felt like a fraud.

But then it came to me.

My memory.

The blank spaces.

I dissociate.

I didn’t even realize it’s a thing I do but it’s a thing I do. The biggest chunks were gone from when the abuse was the worst. Abuse causes trauma. Trauma causes brain damage. I had brain damage. It seemed to be manageable, reversible even, but unless I did the work of healing, my brain would remain functionally damaged

“None of these diagnoses take into account the unusual talents that many of our patients develop or the creative energies they have mustered to survive. All too often diagnoses are mere tallies of symptoms”

My therapist knew I could figure this out with a nudge in the right direction. Trauma did not damage my intellect. That’s the other side of my brain. She told me I had great insight into my situation, “incredible intuition.” I just needed to believe her. I had been practicing yoga since young. I had gotten into meditation, primal movement, energy work, and plant medicine. I was creating deeper, more honest and meaningful relationships. I didn’t know what I was doing, but I was bound and determined to feel better. Come to find out, I was doing what Dr. Van Der Kolk and his team recommended - settling the mind, trusting the body, returning to the present. Even finding my therapist was instinctual. I’d passed by her sign many times on my lunch breaks and finally decided to look up EMDR. Another modality recommended by Van Der Kolk and crew.

I included my birth story in the list of trauma targets, but we end up starting with another target first. It was memory that evoked a powerful visceral reaction. It could almost precipitate a panic attack if I dwelled too long on it. I wasn’t able to put it into words even in her office, but I could give enough to find it.

A little girl always remembers what her daddy tells her.

She remembers her mommy and her daddy fighting all the time.

She remembers them fighting so loudly, it kept her up at night.

It keeps her up at night.

She remembers things breaking.

Hearts breaking.

She remembers crying herself to sleep.

She remembers going to school with sleep and sadness in her eyes.

She remembers her teacher asking her what was wrong.

She remembers it’s okay to talk to an adult you trust.

She remembers that from television.

Or from school.

She remembers her teacher calling her mommy.

She remembers coming home to her mommy’s eyes.

There was fear in those eyes, she remembers that but it doesn’t click until years later. She remembers the voices.

She remembers the foot falls.

She remembers being scared of her daddy.

She remembers his hand around her throat.

She remembers her toes trying to touch the ground.

She remembers her daddy telling her,

“Don’t you ever speak about what goes on in this house, do you hear me?”

She remembers.

She always remembers.

A little girl always remembers what her daddy tells her.

Do you remember that scene in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind when as the two technicians from Lacuna are wiping Joel’s memories, you see them slowly fade? First the edges get less distinct. Backgrounds turn dark. Details like facial expressions go blank. And then gone.

At the end of that first session, she had me take a few deep breaths and just scan my body to see how I was feeling. My heart rate had slowed. I no longer heard my pulse in my head. My hands were warm. I could take a deep breath without it hurting. I remember I stood up slowly and stretched. That full body opening and release a prey animal might do when they are safe. The lion was gone. The stress hormones were dispersing. I sobbed. Tears of joy. Grief. Relief. She told me to go home and rest and that I would probably continue to reprocess on my own over the next few days now that my brain had knew how to do it.

That was three years ago. I’ve several more sessions since then, but I’m fairly certain that was the linchpin memory. A lot of things felt better after that. There was a shift in energy. I still manage my healing journey based on instinct and intuition. I no longer dissociate. I allow myself to feel everything now. I write things down a lot. It helps to put thing into words. To at least try. I am probably neurodivergent although these days I don’t know if it’s trauma or undiagnosed ADHD. There’s a lot of overlap there, according to the book. I don’t know if it worth it to get an official diagnosis though. On the one hand, I don’t think I need medication as I have drastically changed my lifestyle to accommodate. On the other hand, there is some psychological satisfaction in giving language to your feelings.

My memory is better, even though things still come in patchy. Sometimes it’s only a few pictures. I do get emotional, but not hijacked. My creativity is flourishing. Some times old memories come to me in poems, as it lends itself well to images, sounds and physical sensations rather than a cohesive story with a beginning, middle and end.

A little girl remembers everything.