Memory Loss (Year 1 Wed.)
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After watching this documentary, I can agree with this statement. Essentially, we are all human beings and maybe there is something in our character that stays in us no matter what happens. But we are also dreams and thoughts which Clive doesn’t have so it must be something deep inside us that makes us still be us.
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On the other hand, Alexandra and Jowita, he is stuck in the present, has no past and no future. You can’t really have a conversation with him, because he forgets what he said several seconds ago. How can you be sure that his personality hasn’t changed if he is conscious just for several seconds?
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That’s what I was thinking of watching the film. What personality do we mean? This 7 second personality, which disappears in unconsciousness almost immediately? Is it personality at all?
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That’s right but it wasn’t mentioned anything about his general change of personality, I think. So, as I said, it may be due to his personality traits which are still “his”. He says and behave like his quite “old version” but he doesn’t know that.
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I based my opinion on how his family (mostly Deborah) view him because I don’t know what he was like before. But I have to admit that the clips from eariler years of his condition really strucked me. He was way more agressive and emotional and it made me wonder what version of Clive is more similar to that before he lost his memory.
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The scary part is that Clive compaired his state to being dead. Even the fact that his family are able to recognize a lot old Clive in him he still suffers. I can’t imagine how hard it must be for him that the thing he compares his life to is death.
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Yes, I think the worst thing is that he KNOWS there’s something wrong. He knows that his mind is empty, and can do nothing with that. It was heartbreaking to see how desperately he tried to “catch” the moments of consciousness in his diaries.
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Clive had lost his memory but his character and personality stayed the same. Even one of his sons mentioned that his father is in 3/4 still the old Clive. He still has the same passion for music and he’s a lovely and witty person. Those things show that human’s being is more than just brain and processes. I think that’s why Deborah couldn’t really leave him to start a new life because although he can’t remember very much he still has the same personality.
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Yes! This thing with Deborah – I haven’t come up with it. There really must be something in it. Deborah loves him as he didn’t change. She is really caring.
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The part when Clive’s daughter confessed that she thinks she couldn’t do for his father as much as Deborah and that she would have probably given up really moved me. The fact that Deborah even after a moment of doubt still came back to Clive is really astounding and brave.
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Exactly. Not everyone is able to behave fairly normally to someone who is touched by something like amnesia. It isn’t easy but Deborah can be a great example for everyone.
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I don’t think she should have left but I’m also very glad that she moved for some time to U.S. to rethink everything that happened. Deborah then realised that she didn’t want anyone but Clive. She is only a human and she needed someting to ease the pain. In her case she didn’t find peace by starting new life but she found it in God.
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I can see that you payed attention while watching the video 🙂
Was it because I asked you to watch it or because it was of interest to you (or both? 🙂 -
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Clive said a few times that he is dead. Every night and day were the same and that was very painful for him. He lost his memory not his personality so he was still him every 7 second but he wasn’t truly himself because he lost too much of memories that make us who we are.
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I agree with Deborah’s statement. Although he lost his memory he remained the same person – he was intelligent, full of passion, gentle, he had his love to Deborah and his children. These things formed his personality and made him the real Clive.
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Indeed. Do you think that without a support he still would have been the same?
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I think so, because he is not aware of the support that he has. He is himself all the time, no matter if Deborah is around or if he’s writing in his diary. His personality is there no matter if he is conscious or not, there’s no trigger for him to start acting a certain way, he just acts as himself all the time. What do you think though?
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I actually don’t agree with you. I think the love to his wife and the love that he receives is mostly what makes him who he is. After they memory loss he used to be agressive, but it passed and now he is calm and steady. I must say that his wife is truly a beautiful and really supportive person and in my opinion we should give her a credit.
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I mean it must have been really hard for her. She was young, she wanted to have children. And the situation was scary. We can’t judge her that she wanted to start a new life. I understand that. It’s hard for me to say if she should have left him for good. Well, she tried to, but a true love won.
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It was actually shocking to me how much of his own personality he has. With amnesia you would think that little things the person does disappear, but Clive was his own person. Even though he had no recollection of any events, he would still know some things, he would remember numbers from his childhood, he would bite his fingers when he would get shy and joke around about wanting to drink some gin and tonic or go to a pub. It was very surprising to me, but I totally agree with Deborah now, even though before I have thought that our memory is us and all we had of ourselves.
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Honestly – I don’t know. Of course, in some sense Clive was still Clive. He loved music, was able to play piano, he could remember his family members, he was kind and had some part of his personality. But I’m not sure if he was truly himself, and what’s the worst – he didn’t feel like Clive at all. His mind was blank, “no thoughts, no dreams; nights and days the same”, as he said. He wouldn’t be able to remember his grandchildren names, he wouldn’t even remember that he has grandchildren. His life was quite horrible – every day he woke up to the reality he didn’t recognize. Maybe he was calm and happy, but how can you feel anything else if you’re not able to remember what
doyou exactly feel? I don’t know. In my opinion Clive was still Clive in some sense, but at the same time he lost himself irrevocably.-
You have point here, for sure he wasn’t truly himself. But we can’t tell that after
loosinglosing his memory he was unrecognisable, so that may be a proof that being a human is not only processing in our brains. We are not just our thoughts, dreams, momories – Clive didn’t have anything of that, but he still was “someone”.
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While watching this document I couldn’t stop smiling. Clive just seemed such a lovely human being. He was intelligent, funny and just likable. He loved his wife and children, despite the fact that he couldn’t remember any memories with them. It shows that even if we lost big part of our memory we still have our personality. He didn’t lost all his memory, although – he still had procedural and semantic memory.
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I don’t know if you can talk about personality when he’s being himself for 7 seconds during any conversation.
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But after all he is himself those every 7 seconds of conversation. He does little things that make him Clive. He bites his fingers when he’s shy, he jokes around, he does remember numbers from childhood, he can feel love to Deborah. Don’t you think that is what his personality is made of? Just because he is incomplete (lacking memory) doesn’t mean he’s not there.
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I agree. I think these small details make him the person he has always been. It feels as if these little things “helped” him to remain the same through all these years
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I also totally agree with Karolina. There is nothing to add. He definitely had part of his personality.
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And the fact that he can still play the piano is really moving.
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I’m glad you mentioned these types of memory, Emilia.
Here are some questions to everyone:– Is there any evidence in the video that Clive’s sensory memory is still functioning?
– Is there any evidence in the video that Clive’s sensory short-term memory (STM) is still functioning?
– Does he seem to have implicit long-term memory (LTM)?
– Does he seem to have any semantic memory?
– Does he seem to have episodic memory?-
His sensory memory is still functioning for sure. He is able to remember things for 7 seconds, and sensory memory lasts about 0,5 s.
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I think that Clive still have some sort of semantic memory. He uses abstract concepts like “human being”, and yet he says that he sees it for the first time ever. Despite of being unable to recognize specific details of things he encounters, he knows about their general properties.
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I think he has sementic memory because he knows about stuff but he doesn’t have episodic memory because he isn’t able to define time, location or any facts about events. Maybe the fact that he was watching a game on televion is an example of sementic memory. He knows watching a sport even though he didn’t know who was playing or what the score was.
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“Maybe the fact that he was watching a game on televion is an example of sementic memory” – no, rather not, but the score of the match/game (if he remembered it) would be in his semantic memory.
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Ok, I understand it now.
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He seem to have semantic memory, he talks with people so he knows definitions of words, he know language. If it comes to episodic memory I am not sure. His wife told that he knows some facts about his life, but he
don’tdoesn’t remember it. For example he knows that they are married, but he can’t remember the wedding, so I think that he do not have episodic memory, because he can’t remember any events. -
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And an example of implicit long-term memory may be his ability to play the piano.
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Indeed, playing the piano is an example of long-term, implicit, procedural memory.
What else could be the example of this subtype of memory?-
It can be also brushing his teeth, I think. Although he has instruction about it near the mirror, he can do it himself. And other, the ability to write – he writes notes every time he thinks he is conscious.
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I feel like the evidence of his sensory memory could be the fact that he had “musical flashbacks” as we see at the beginning. When he moves his fingers like he would be playing, although he is just tapping his leg. I wouldn’t say his short-term and long-term memory and episodic memory are functioning, he can’t learn new things, he doesn’t remember anything from the past, he just knows some things but he has no recollection of them actually happening. I think he does have semantic memory about a few things like names of objects, but I don’t think this part of his memory was shown enough in the documentary.
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“I wouldn’t say his short-term and long-term memory and episodic memory are functioning, he can’t learn new things, he doesn’t remember anything from the past, he just knows some things”.
What others think about Karolina’s statement?
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I agree with Karolina. Although he may remember some things from his life, for example that Deborah was his wife, I don’t think this had anything to do with memory.
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as an example of episodic memory – one member of the family mentioned that he might have some single childhood memories. Also – he still can write some notes, so it is example of procedural LTM.
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And he can make sentences of words from vehicle registration plates while being a passenger in a car, if I’m not wrong.
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No, it’s rather implicit memory. Or I would say, it may be associated also with semantic memory because he needs to have some knowledge to make a sentence. It’s hard to say.
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There’re evidences of his implicit long-term memory still working since despite his amnesia he still knows how to play piano, how to write or how to move around the house. He has no trouble performing these tasks depite not knowing the exact point of his life at which he learned them.
Other than that his semantic memory also seems to be working since he has no trouble with using languge and such. The part of his memory that was mostly affected by his condition seems to be his episodic memory. -
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I agree because Clive still have his own personality and specific reactions to some things. Also he can’t remember anything yet he can play music which is big and important part of his life. I think Debra said that because she realised she loves him for who his is and can’t leave his side despite his condition.
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I agree with Deborah, as Clive remained the same despite his memory loss. I found that very comforting, as even though
he couldn’t form any new memories, he was not particularly sad about it. Sometimes he got irritated when he didn’t remember doing something, but overall he was still the same person. He enjoyed playing the piano or watching the game. It didn’t bother him that he didn’t know who was winning or who was playing at all. Clive is very humorous and likes the presence of his wife and closest family.-
Yes, it was very soothing to see that he remained calm, although that was not the case at the beginning, were we saw how he was arguing with Deborah in 1986 because he wouldn’t remember something. It’s scary how frustrating that must’ve been, but it’s so nice to see that he is calm now. But is there something that surprised you the most in his case of amnesia? Or how he somehow deals with it?
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I agree, at first, he was crying all the time at how he couldn’t remember anything and would constantly call Deborah. I was a little startled how easily he could remember things from his childhood, such as combinations of numbers but couldn’t recall the visits of his closest family.
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Not really. He remembers the car plate of his dad’s car but doesn’t recall the car itself. He also remembers the phone number he had when he was a little kid.
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Probably the moment when Deborah got sad after the family dinner. She knew Clive wouldn’t remember anything from that day and for her, it was special that his son came to visit. I think that she is a very strong and courageous woman, and it definitely showed in the documentary.
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I wouldn’t say he wasn’t sad. He said that he feels like he was dead, and he said it a few times. I think he was sad and lost. He was happy when he saw people he knew, obviously, but when he was alone or with strangers, he wasn’t happy at all.
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Possibly, as he could have found comfort in those visits. I think it was hard for him to tell as his brain was blank and empty. Although he referred to death as not “difficult”, he seemed to be a little concerned with the whole situation.
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Joanna, Gabriela, do you think that Deborah’s or his children’s visits matter over a longer period of time?
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Deborah mentioned in the documentary while they were having dinner with Clive’s son, that he wouldn’t remember having it at all. When he sees his family from time to time, he acts as if he hadn’t seen them in a long time. But despite that, I think it’s important that Deborah and the family visit him since clearly he is very happy when they do and cherishes those moments.
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I wouldn’t say he wasn’t sad. He said that he feels like he was dead, and he said it a few times. I think he was sad and lost. He was happy when he saw people he knew, obviously, but when he was alone or with strangers, he wasn’t happy at all.
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To be honest I don’t know the answer for this question, at some point I think it’s true because although Clive lost his memory he did not
looselose lovetofor his wife, his passion for music, his personality. But on the other hand hewasn’tisn’t able to livebyon his own, even himself compared his life to being dead. There was a scene when he was sitting with his sister and they looked so happy, but when she left he said that hedoesn’tdidn’t know who the reporteriswas talking about. I believe that memories and people in our lives make us the way we are, not only personality and when you can’t remember any of it you are just like a baby – innocent and vulnerable. -
I agree with her statement, because even though I don’t know him, while watching the doccumentary I could see he remained his wit, intelligence and passion. And people who do know him could still see the man they loved even 20 years after he lost his memory. If he was gone along with his memory Deborah probably wouldn’t come back and yet she decided to devote her life to him.
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I agree, if it wasn’t for the way he was, if he was just an empty shell – I don’t think Deborah would come back as well. He was still himself, just a little bit harder to deal with. Do you remember why she wanted to leave him in the first place?
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She said that she felt like a wife and a widow at the same time. She divorced him and moved to USA because she wanted to start a family – she didn’t have a chance to do this with Clive, because he lost his memory just 18 months after they got married.
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I agree with Deborah’s statment. The documentary showed that despite his condition, in a lot of areas Clive remained his old self. His persoanlity hasn’t changed and he still is the same jolly and intelligent person as he once was. I shows that there’s more to a person than just their memories
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He didn’t loose his semantic memory, he still knew how to play, how to sing, how to talk, etc. He knew that his wife was his wife, he just didn’t remember moments like their wedding or his concerts, so he lost his episodic memory.
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Deborah wants to believe that despite his illness, Clive is still himself. She’s living a dream. Clive is the same human being as he was when it comes to his appearance but inside he is not a person anymore. He lost everything including his personality. Metaphorically Clive’s like an empty box.
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His long term memory is partly working, for example he remembers that he is married but he doesn’t remember the ceremony.
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There is an evidence that his short term memory was still functioning. He compulsively was writing about his awakens in a dairy. That means that for a short time he was able to understand what is happening. The saddest thing was that every time he wrote something he immediately forgot about it and whole writing starts again
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We are partly the sum of our memories, but as we can see from the example of Clive, even without them we still have some personal characteristics. For Deborah, Clive’s life is more than just a brain process. Despite the fact that Clive has lost his memories and living with him is very difficult, he still has the same sense of humor and traits she loved. Their relationship is also based on her memories of him.
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I agree with her statement on some level. Clive lost his memories but he’s personality remained in some way. He was always witty, intelligent and full of passion and that did’t change with his memory loss. He stll loved his wife and kids, his love for music also remained. But on the other hand I think it’s impossible to stay truly yourself when you only know what’s happened in the past seven seconds of your life.
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I do not agree with Deborah’s statement. Despite of his brain damage, Clive’s brain was still functioning and he remembered several things he learnt in the past, and for me it seemed that he was even able to learn new things. I think that he somehow learnt that he has seven second memory, because after years he changed his behaviour and became really peacefully about his state of mind. It even seemed that he wasn’t suprised that he forgets (he reacted very naturally to things which should be completly new for him), but just about what he forgets.
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His sensory memory is still working since he can remember thing up to 7 seconds. When it comes to the short-term memory I’m not sure if it works due to fact that such memory can last longer than 7 seconds. I think he have some long-term memory because he remembers his wife, children and how to play music. Also he have semantic memory since for example he could guess Debra’s job and commented on it like he knew what she’s doing there. In case of episodic memory he can’t recall such events as his own wedding so he lose this kind of memory.
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“When it comes to the short-term memory I’m not sure if it works due to fact that such memory can last longer than 7 seconds” – yes, it’s still functioning but only for about seven seconds.
You’ve mentioned the piano – which subtype of memory is it?
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It’s a long-term memory – implicit (unconscious). To be exact procedural memory.
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As for me, it isn’t strictly true what Deborah said. Clive with his amnesia could seem to be himself in the large part for his wife, children and sister. But he knew he wasn’t. Moreover, he said he felt like a dead person. His case shows how important memory is in our life. He couldn’t stay unaided even for a while and I think it’s fundamental to us to live on our own as individuals.
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No, why? You mean if it was upsetting to watch Clive’s making a note of his time of consciousness and every time thinking he’s doing it for the first time? For me, it wasn’t upsetting. I just tried to understand how hard it has to be to live like that.
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Why not? Because it shows how lost he is in his moment-to-moment existence. We said here many times that despite his condition, he has kept his intelligence, so being a highly intelligent man he realises that something is wrong, which makes him feel like he was dead, and he just can’t put his finger on it.
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His situation is upsetting and I have no doubt about it. Having tried to understand his life, I thought about him saying that his life is like death but it was rather touching than upsetting for me when he was content that he is conscious in that moment. Of course, the upsetting part is when he can’t remember writing something like that before and every moment, let’s say, is his first moment. This is upsetting for me.
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I wasn’t referring to the moments of “feeling awake” or “feeling alive” – clearly in these moments he feels relief and hope that things will improve. What is upsetting for me how fleeting they are are and how easily in his case hope is replaced with despair.
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Yes, I totally agree with you. Hope lasts a few seconds for him.
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It did
mademake me feel uneasy, I felt frustrated thinking about not being able to be conscious, and feeling like I am finally awake only now, but can’t remember that I have written there before. But from what I saw he felt kind of satisfied when he would feel awake (now, not back in the 80’s when he obviously felt frustrated), so maybe if I was in his position I wouldn’t feel that way. But the idea of it itself makes me anxious. -
he considered all entries to be the first written consciously, but again he did not remember writing it… so after few minutes, another line is about him being awake, he is able to recognize previous ones, but he still can’t remember writing them. as if he got stuck in another dimension, not knowing what he could believe, and after a while forget about it again.
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The fact that he had to write entries constantly and not remember writing them, made me upset. He only recognized his penmanship. At first, he got angry and didn’t recall keeping a diary, but after some time I think he enjoyed it and liked looking back on it.
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It was actually the most upsetting part of the film. Watching him desperately trying to make sense of what is happening almost made me cry. And it was really sad when he got mad and confused when he could’t remember ever writing in the diary. And the fact that he was writing the same thing over and over again was almost like a scene from a horror movie for me.
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What made me upset in this part of the film wasn’t the fact that he kept his diary, but Clive’s reaction. He seemed so happy in those very rare and precious moments of ‘awaking’ and only seconds later he didn’t ever remember them and the process repeated itself.
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It was very saddening in my opinion. Knowing, that the moments that in Clive’s eyes were an “awakening”, were actually just a part of a repeating cycle that he wasn’t even aware of, was heartbreakng. Especially since with each one he seemed so happy and sure that “this is the one”.
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It’s unbelievable that a common virus – virus simplex – that most people had or will have as a cold sore on the lip may cause such a devastation in the human brain.
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Yes, it’s very hard to imagine that something so smalll could have such a big impact on our body. In a way it shows that things like this can happen to anyone and that sometimes minor illnesses have bigger consequences than we might think.
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It was a little bit upsetting because with every entry he thought he was conscious for the very first time in his life. Even though he could recognize his handwriting in his previous entries he still coudn’t remember writing them.
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I think we can’t really live without memory. You can’t do anything if you don’t remember what happened a few seconds ago. With amnesia like Clive had, your life can’t be well organized, fluent. Without memory, you aren’t able to live on your own.
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Memory is an integral part of our lives even when we’re not aware of it. Abilty to memorise, remember and recall events, names, things etc. is something we make use of every second without realizing it. It kinda gives us this awareness that we’re constantly changing and moving from one point to another instead of just staying in one place.
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My memory and mental condition can affect not only my life, but also my beloved ones and change it permanently. We’ve learned that human brain is the most important organ, but many of the processes taking place in it are still unknown or inexplicable.
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Memory is an essential in our lives and we don’t even think about. We use the sentence “I don’t remember” on daily basis, for example at school or even when we do some routine like closing the door, often we can’t remember if we did that. But those are small things, we don’t realize how powerful memory is until we see the proof like this documentary. We keep getting angry when we forget about something, but we don’t know how lucky we are to remember and recognize our relatives, homes, our lives.
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Thank you for the discussion. I really enjoyed it. The topic will be open so you are very welcome to add your further comments. I will catch up with everything you will write.
I wish you a Happy Easter despite the tough times. I hope that things will come back to normal soon.Meanwhile, I’d like you to study these lessons and do all the exercises there (together with the exercises in unit 4 from the book):
In the coming days, I will send you a text/a link to a movie to read/see for the next lesson.
Have a good day!
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I agree with Deborah Wearing statement “I realised that we are not just brain and processes. Clive had lost all that and yet he was still Clive”, because even after losing memory people are usually living similarly like they used to live before. I mean, they are living in the same home, with the same people, they just don’t remember some things, or like Clive – most things, but they are still the same people. For example, when his wife was talking that he only watches rugby or cricket, I think it may testify that he liked it before, and maybe his brain connections are somehow coming back for these little moments. Of course, he may be watching these programs only because there is not much to remember in this, but I think it is worth to consider other options. Moreover, in my opinion, after losing memory and having amnesia like Clive it is very precious to have help from family and he had it from Deborah, his wife. Summarizing, I think even after losing memory, people are usually still the same people, even Clive’s wife said, that he doesn’t remember her, but he knows her. So, it is really amazing that even without theirs brain abilities people are still able to remain in relationships.
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