My earliest memory was when I was 6. I was playing with my older sister when we got into a fight and she threw a tea cup at my eye. I ended up getting a cut and had to go to the doctor. I refused to sit still so he blew up his glove and I played with it while he examined my eye.
To be honest, I'm not sure if I can exactly confirm that "this is me" since the memory doesn't seem to show anything about my personality. I don't fight with my sister as much but I still get myself into stupid situations where I get hurt physically and emotionally. Although my reaction at the doctor's office seems consistent with who I am now. I can make myself enjoy something I usually wouldn't like if there was another medium I would do it through. For example, I don't like exercising but I know I need to so I made myself join a sports team.
I agree that it is very common for a person to remember something because it was a traumatic event. My first memory is very similar in that I remember when a block fell on me and I was injured. The fact that so many people have first memories that are related to a painful or traumatic experience is really interesting because often it seems you try to put these experiences out of your memory, which seems to oppose this common theme of it starting your memory.
I agree with ehollins28 as well, because many traumatic or embarrising moments of my childhood I remember as well. When I was seven, I distinctly remember hurting my eye, my last day of vacation in Puerto Rico, and having to wear an eye patch all day. Although I remember little else from the trip, that memory of suffering clearly sticks out.
Similar... not the earliest memory but one of my early memories is one where i mistepped on staircase and hit the right side of my face (only 1 cm away from my eye) on the edge of the staircase. it was pretty traumatic for me because that was the first time i ever had over 15 stitches. i think the memories that deal with suffering and pain just remains in our memory to remind us that this kind of "traumatic" event never occurs again.
My memory was totally different from this, but I can relate to getting into weird situations where I get hurt. When I was younger I used to get hurt because of weird things I did and I'm the same way now.
