How many of us have hyperphantasia?

[Gerald Wilgus]

As I have done the work of deep introspection in learning and dealing with earlier social trauma I have come to recognize that I probably have hyperphantasia. there are memories where I can recall the sights, smells, textures, emotions, and even tastes (that last makes me a good cook) of memories. This had injured me when I wwould be triggered to inhabit the mind of that young adult. It is like I could be in the scene and inspect its every element. I've been reading about aphantasia and hyperphantasia and I think I have hyperphantasia. Do others here exhibit that? Now, I have been pairing injurious thoughts with memories of joy and perseverence. I think that reflexively generating the strong positive memories is helping me stay on an even keel.

 

[Outdated]

My memories are like that, with sight, sound, smell, touch and emotional context too. My imagination is the same, it covers all the senses.To remember something I relive it, because of this I learnt very early on to not dwell on things. I was also able to accept a lot of what happened to me because I saw others suffer far worse, some of my memories really are not all that pleasant.

 

[WhitewaterWoman]

Im the opposite. Total darkness.

 

[Masked Man]

No, I have not experienced that with trauma. I am only really acutely aware of my own feelings/response, which I realize through therapy is often overblown or out of proportion.

The only time I get these vivid memories are with good memories. There is usually a smell that triggers a long-forgotten memory, and it all comes back, but I think this may be normal for most people.

 

[Gerald Wilgus]

No, I have not experienced that with trauma. I am only really acutely aware of my own feelings/response, which I realize through therapy is often overblown or out of proportion.

The only time I get these vivid memories are with good memories. There is usually a smell that triggers a long-forgotten memory, and it all comes back, but I think this may be normal for most people.

Yes, ordinarily smells can be powerful memory triggers.

 

[the_tortoise]

This is why discussing intense traumatic memories differentiating them from "normal" memory is so difficult for me based on how most people conceptualize "flashbacks" and "normal memories" -- why the only thing I use to define a"flashback" is that it refers to when memories get stuck in my mind and I cannot stop them replaying and remaining the focal point of all mental activity. Has nothing to do with the way I remember it...

It is why truly hopeless task to get me to re-process any memory "normally" when "normally" means "not as vivid reliving" because for me vivid reliving is the only type of memory I have; LITERALLY ALL of my memories are vivid reliving in mostly full sensory (many are missing audio or only have the melodies of people's voices and rather garbled background cacophony because I have difficulty with auditory processing resulting from hyperacusis, language issues and constant sensory overload, and many are sort of oddly patchy again because I live with basically constant sensory overload and also because I have wandering uncontrolled attention and difficulty with sequencing but:_); This means ALL OF THEM match descriptions of "flashbacks" -- the good, the bad, and the neutral and completely random. I don't know how else it is possible to remember things....

My thoughts also take concrete sensory form based on memory.

 

[tree]

Hyperphantasia is the condition of having extremely vivid mental imagery. It is the opposite condition to aphantasia, where mental visual imagery is not present. The experience of hyperphantasia is more common than aphantasia and has been described as being "as vivid as real seeing". Hyperphantasia constitutes all five senses within vivid mental imagery, although literature on the subject is dominated by "visual" mental imagery research, with a lack of research on the other four senses.

Hyperphantasia - Wikipedia

 

[JayCee]

All them memories is in there somewhere . And reliving them through a thoroughly detailed
images of traumatic memories,( some real humdingers) just rather not see if I can recall them. Just finish my little projects here and there,And enjoy the distraction. Even after 10 years of talk therapy and tried almost every single SSRI available in the USA pharmacopia.

 

[Gerald Wilgus]

So very true. The vividness of some negative memories was really disturbing and the reason I had sought help through CPT.

 

[JayCee]

Psychologist during those 10 years told me, my vivid recall , Was Mot considered flashbacks . As some People whom survived the Veit Nam War , would completely disassociate current reality for actually mental and physically being there in the theatre of actual combat ,at the moments, of the reality when their PTSD stressors , occurred .
Making for some unrealistic interactions of their real life . As compared to what was actually occuring around them. Possibly things such as after taking their wives to be Veit Nam soldier ,upon coming to in a very waking reality dream. Possibly trying to fend off a entire police and swat members,thinking their yard was a battlezone ,back in the day . After some unfortunate interaction that triggered these memories. Some not as severe
just hiding out ,in there homes until fatigue set in and they basically would pass out . And come to,in what was their normal real life reality. And the various levels,went all over the spectrum. Hiding out in the No. Calif. Great Redwood forest. In cobbled together hueches. Possibly with one or 2 other "old tyme Nam Vets" watching out for each other.
As their beliefs were none understood their reality.And would booby trap the entire areas around their encampments. And the functional one grew Pot feilds back in the late and middle 1970s to get money from dealers. Snd info compiled from my therapist and a few old Vets that took me into their confidence as well as some dope dealers,Who might bring some Humbolt gold bavk to So. Calif, when I lived there.

 

[Ken]

Pretty sure I qualify as hyperphantasia, if I understand the definition correctly. My strongest case is an extreme case of childhood trauma. I witnessed the murder of my absolute best friends. I don't even consider that a "memory"; I just relive the event in all respects. Even the expressions on my friends faces as they were being killed. I felt, and feel, the experience as if I were them. Everything from the angle of the sun to the mannerisms of the murderers, weather, - everything. That happened when I was about six or seven. I guess that is also a PTSD. In any event, I don't think it is curable. If it is, I wouldn't want to because I don't want to forget the best friends of my life. Although it can be quite debilitating.

Otherwise, I also relive memories in absolute vivid detail that are good, although none is as powerful as that trauma.

I think that hyperphantasia has also been a plus in my career as an electronics design engineer as I can "see" and "feel" the experience of the inner workings of the electronics I'm working with. I feel "connected" to it. You might think this is weird, but I even feel empathy for the circuits. Witnessing someone abusing an electronic device is painful to me.

 

[JayCee]

Per Kens writing above, My late Husband was A aircraft design/ redisign engineer and arerospace mechanic in his various careers in the years after his Veit Nam experience. He claimed mechanical things have a spirit . And treated them as such and took this mentality into the world of World speed record breaking Cars at Bonneville and Muroc dry Lakes as a hobby . World record holders with others and his own Race car efforts in the 1960s and beyond . We did have a issue between us regarding these things as I had grow up around electrical engineers ( Father) and Car hot rodders, Few girls where I grew up and brothers into hotrod and racing hobbies. Issue was he did not believe in entropy .And I had experienced it, in several English cars I had owned and at least 1 american one ( all older vehicles) This is not to discount all the various traumas we both had over the years . Good point about the Hyperphantasia and those subsequent connections in ones life .

 

[Gerald Wilgus]

Pretty sure I qualify as hyperphantasia, if I understand the definition correctly. My strongest case is an extreme case of childhood trauma. I witnessed the murder of my absolute best friends. I don't even consider that a "memory"; I just relive the event in all respects. Even the expressions on my friends faces as they were being killed. I felt, and feel, the experience as if I were them. Everything from the angle of the sun to the mannerisms of the murderers, weather, - everything. That happened when I was about six or seven. I guess that is also a PTSD. In any event, I don't think it is curable. If it is, I wouldn't want to because I don't want to forget the best friends of my life. Although it can be quite debilitating.

Otherwise, I also relive memories in absolute vivid detail that are good, although none is as powerful as that trauma.

I think that hyperphantasia has also been a plus in my career as an electronics design engineer as I can "see" and "feel" the experience of the inner workings of the electronics I'm working with. I feel "connected" to it. You might think this is weird, but I even feel empathy for the circuits. Witnessing someone abusing an electronic device is painful to me.

I am sad at your memory. I know how the immediacy of clear memory can cause one to inhabit the mind; of that terrified child; or in my case an isolated, existentially lonely, young man feeling like a failure at life.