Okay, so I'm a little confused, because I have two pretty early memories, and I'm not sure which one happened first, so I picked the more vivid one..
I remember when I was about 3 or 4 being in a hospital. I was not a patient though... I didn't really understand the setting so I was exploring (as little kids do) and kept asking "what" and "why" questions. I remember being in the hospital room and my grandmom was a patient--she had a stroke. It was weird because I remember knowing my grandmom worked in a hospital but I knew she wasn't supposed to be the one being cared for... and she couldn't really talk to me. My mom was talking to the doctor so I was in my grandmom's hospital room with my aunt (Mom's sister) and my older sister. I guess my older sister must have stopped answering my questions because I started asking my grandmom, and when she didn't answer I directed my questions toward my aunt.. After a few minutes she got annoyed and said "You better stop being bad or Mom-Mom (my grandmom) is going to get out of that bed and get you."
That seemed so silly to me, because I looked at my grandmom and knew that she couldn't get out of bed, although I had no idea at that time what it meant to have a stroke or to be paralyzed. Just when my aunt said that my mom walked in the room and told her to shut up.. I guess she had just found out the extent of her paralysis..
I'm pretty sure this must be a memory because I've never really talked to anyone about this except to find out which year my grandmom had strokes. I'm not sure if this was her first or second stroke, because I know she had two. When I sort of re-live this scene, I see it through my eyes, where I'm looking up at the hospital bed and at everyone else in the room, pointing up at things... everything was above me... and the layout of the room seemed so large, although I know now that hospital rooms (in that hospital) are pretty small... and it was really bright---I don't know if that's significant.
I do feel like I'm the same person as that young girl in the hospital, with more knowledge of course. I still ask questions when I see something I don't understand, and I still start with the person I'm more comfortable with in choosing who to ask. I also still get that yearning to understand and use inference to try to figure out the effects before asking about the causes... I think I remember my feelings during that scene although they're hard to explain.
-- Edited by Britt on Monday 19th of October 2009 01:47:58 PM
I think it's really interesting that you remember this from a first person viewpoint. Often when I'm thinking back on my memories, I seem to view it in my mind from a birds eye view, almost as if I'm watching a home movie of myself. Maybe you see it from your point of view at the time because it was possibly traumatic. Since it's so vivid, I'm sure it was a very important moment to you.
