Asperger's Syndrome and Memory

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Do you have a great memory? I don't. Well, when I was younger I did. I don't know why I don't now. Maybe it is due to stress and chemical imbalances. But my memory strengths have always been in recalling conversations or episodic memories. I was never great at memorizing numbers with 100+ digits. In fact, I probably am incapable of it. I thought people with AS had impeccable memories when it came to remembering numbers. Is that only a right handed thing? I'm left handed. Maybe that has something to do with it...

Pretty good, although I'm rubbish with labels (names, numbers) - things that have no intrinsic meaning.

It's an interesting subject. So much of memory is dependent on emotion and we experience emotion very differently than nonautistics, and yet generally I don't think we have worse memories. I find this fasincating.

My memory work in an all-encompassing manner. If i learn something in an environment, then forever in my mind, that bit of information will be linked to all the other forms of sensory input I experienced at the time I learned it.

For example, if I learn to do a new type of math problem while sitting under a tree on a nice spring day while children are playing in the distance, then every time I complete a problem like that one, I will hear children laughing, feel breeze on my face, and smell the scents of spring. Once the problem is complete, these physical sensations are also complete since they are only related to the math problem memory.

Having this type of memory makes dealing with PTSD triggers especially daunting.

It's all over the place. I often forget my own middle name and birthdate, the names of people I've known for years, what I ate an hour ago, etc. But I can tell you what kind of shirt my sister was wearing two months ago when I last visited her. I can list all 22 James Bond movies and 28 Godzilla movies, in order by date, from memory, even though I haven't watched any of them in a long time. I can list every song from every Metallica album, in order, even though I haven't been a fan of them for a long time. I can tell you the names of actors who had very tiny roles in movies I saw ten years ago. I can tell you what I ordered at Wendy's the last time I visited, which was over a month ago.

Yes. I can remember stuff that I understand, which is stuff that's well-linked with lots of references. Fewer references, less chance of remembering. But this is surely how nonautistic memory works because designed 'memory systems' work by increasing references and links to senses and stuff.

I don't have a good memory for anything, especially verbal, but I'm not good at remembering numbers either. I often envy others in my environment who have much better memory, some of them are like walking dictionaries, some of them are really outstanding at a narrow interest. Like I said, I'm not good at remembering things, but I have a relatively good long-term memory for visual and auditive information.

I've noticed that sometimes people have very good memory but their memory isn't always impeccable.

I think my memory is just normal really. I don't remember numbers though. And I'm right-handed.

i have a good memory, especially for stuff that is enhanced by understanding. i was better at genetics and physiology (involving concepts) and not so hot at anatomy (memorizing structures).

I also noticed when I drink energy drinks and caffeine my memory is really poor. It's so noticeable that I jokingly say I think I have dementia. Could I be allergic to caffeine or something inside the energy drinks? Has anyone else experienced this? Is this an AS thing? It usually takes a couple weeks at least to clear up.

Anything more than a cup of tea shuts my brain down. I can drink energy drinks that don't have the caffiene though and those really give me a jolt and I can think well on them. The caffiene seems to kill the effects though.

My memory is really great I think. I can easily remember just about anything, from phone numbers to word for word recitations of conversations I've had years ago. When I was younger (I don't do this anymore because it was kinda hard and people stopped being interested) if someone gave me a book, had me read it, and then gave me the position (such as page 357, paragraph 2, sentence 4) I could recite that sentence after a minute or so of thought, with a very high level of accuracy.

I'm (mostly) ambidextrous also, since someone brought that up.

I have a very good memory, and I think that it is an autistic-type memory that deals with a lot of raw data as-is, no understanding required to store and retrieve the information. My parents called me "The Hard Drive"/"The Computer" and made good use of my memory in many ways when I was little, e.g. play the hoooman tape recorder to recall conversations verbatim and music melodim, consult the hoooman GPS for maps, store and retrieve product serial numbers and eberryday lists to and from the hoooman PDA, look up some information from a cookbook or food package in the hoooman My Pictures folder, etc etc etc. My father also has a very good memory, but he preferred to use mine instead of his own.

I have a terrible memory - we are about 90% sure I've suffered multiple minor-strokes and although people have said this was unlikely to have caused any damage I still argue that it did in fact cause quite severe damage, not least of all to my memory. I don't remember the vast majority of my life, and what I do remember is like an account of someone else's life so very basic and no recollection of emotions connected, then more general things just slip out of my mind all the time. *shrugs*

I have a good memory. But not for instructions, I space out or most verbal type lectures and stuff like that, I space out