If anybody has read my book, they will know that my mother suffered from Alzheimer’s disease. Memory is therefore precious to me as I am now at the age when – with hindsight – she first started to display symptoms.
I've recently watched a TV programme about this with actress Maureen Lipman investigating memory. Two things especially struck chords with me; the treatment of PTSD through ‘talking therapy’ and the way in which memory is recalled.
For my own PTSD, which remained undiagnosed for decades, I found talking was very hard. To speak about the ‘principal event’ was impossible for a long time and in the end it was my wise counsellor who suggested writing rather than talking. This painful process eventually managed to break the logjam in my head and of course eventually led to my book. It has been of benefit because not only can I now write about it as I have in detail in the book, but I can also talk about it, not easily and not in every situation, but writing therapy has worked.
Recall is interesting too. My book starts with my own earliest memory and it was interesting in the programme that all the experts said the science of brain development means that 3 is the earliest we can formulate long term memories because it is tied to the development of language. I’d never thought of that connection before. And of course, the memory that opens the book is when our protagonist is aged 3.
What I found as I started to write was that childhood memories might just start with a single image. For example the lido incident. All I thought I had was the image of me sinking under the water, eyes unexpectedly open, looking at the wall of the pool as I sank. I made a note of it but then as I thought about it I started to recall more about that day; running there, the lockers, the attempt to teach me to swim, his command “Follow me!” and as time went on, actual dialogue. As the book built up, this was happening all over the place, not just the lido but long division, the trauma of the night before we moved north, the ‘principal event’ referred to above and more recent memories.
Much later, the same happened in the police interview. Initially there was no memory of the incident in question leading to confusion and a series of “No comment” replies. There was of course good reason to suppress this memory but as time went by, that day in the forest came back in all its unwelcome gruesomeness. So this process doesn't just apply to childhood memories, but adult ones too.
It was as though all these memories formed some kind of chain and once one started to tug, the whole lot could be pulled out of their hitherto unknown recess back into daylight. Fascinating.
No wonder the book took nearly twenty years to write, but at least if my own memory fails in the future, it’s all there in print.