False Memories

welbeck

Smileless2012
But that is begging the question.
Suppose I assert that I hated going to infant school
Whereas my parent asserts that I skipped into class happily every day.
Which is the false memory?
Or is it even a useful concept?
Not in all cases.
An open listening conversation would be better with mutual input.

That’s about a feeling though isnt it wellbeck.Feelings are subjective, so they can’t really ever be “false”.

But factual happenings are another thing, My daughter insists she has a memory of me smacking her with a wooden spoon. I have never smacked anyone with a wooden spoon🤔🙄

Fortunately it hasn’t been an issue for her. I just st have to let it go because it’s very real to her though totally false. But how awful if that false memory had led her to estrange me.

Lathyrus3

The whole false memory thing is very interesting I think.

I definitely have one very clear (to me) false memory from my adulthood, of my daughter as a small baby lying on the sofa, in the living room with the sunlight on her face making her blink and sneeze.

I know this is a false memory because a) we did not buy that sofa until she was three and b) the house we lived in when she was a baby faced north.

But it is totally real as a picture memory. Obviously I have conflated stuff from babyhood, later and maybe even a totally different place. Or a dream🙄

I find it fascinating that people remember events differently.

I doubt it matters at all in the whole of life.

ordinarygirl

Even if she was correct - what does it matter? i gather she is not telling people you abused her either mentally or physically?
Maybe, when she tells the stories that people are probably fed up of hearing , you say that you didn't have much money so you did what you did . I think the more you disagree the more you feed into her stories . I think she is being perverse for the fun of it?

Truth matters.

There are so very many reasons why truth matters.

fancythat

ordinarygirl

Even if she was correct - what does it matter? i gather she is not telling people you abused her either mentally or physically?
Maybe, when she tells the stories that people are probably fed up of hearing , you say that you didn't have much money so you did what you did . I think the more you disagree the more you feed into her stories . I think she is being perverse for the fun of it?

Truth matters.

There are so very many reasons why truth matters.

Recollections vary. Family truth may be indiscernible.

No matter unless one wants to worry over others notions.

It isnt just worry.
It can go way beyond that.

I only had to scroll back to two posts before mine to find this.

What if there had been estrangement?
What if, the poster is loking after her gc , and the daughter says to anyone, "I saw my mum use a wooden spoon, just like she did with me" type thing.

Dangerous.

^But factual happenings are another thing, My daughter insists she has a memory of me smacking her with a wooden spoon. I have never smacked anyone with a wooden spoon🤔🙄

Fortunately it hasn’t been an issue for her. I just st have to let it go because it’s very real to her though totally false. But how awful if that false memory had led her to estrange me.^

LadyDark

False memory can be a terrible and dangerous thing! Some people have been accused and sentenced to prison and had their lives and reputations ruined on the strength of 'false memory'. Therapists & other mental health workers tend to encourage and act on these memories as they are afraid they 'MAY' be true.

And then this one. To name but two.