childhood description of internal world

Post Reply New Topic

As a child I was in like "trapped" an inner world full of colours and patterns and sounds in a way, I also do have a synesthesia of colour - sound, sound -colour. When my parents for example called my name, I heard it but I was not able to leave that world many times which made me unable to react hear my parents calling my name.
It never went away completely, but I have learned to be more alert to the "outside world", but I realized it like age 27, before I could not differenciate that much, as I also thought that everyone was in a sort of this world and had a synesthesia of sound and colour and I had to learn that it was not the way, and I was like not understanding people were experiencing differently, and still it is hard to imagine, but I remind ne consciously about it.
I was also very "trapped" in patterns, like staring at the wallpaper of my room.
And I still do this much time of the day, but it just happens and at a moment I realize myself in this state and try to move myself away from it.
I still feel this a lot and often do not realize that I am "trapped" in colours and patterns and sound again.
What experiences do you have thinking about childhood being "detached" from the "world" and did you overcome it?
What I find very strange is that my being "trapped" in this colours and sounds and patterns do match a lot with people, who had a near-death-experience, but I never had a near-death-experience, it is just how I am in the inside.
What are you experiences of inner world, keeping you from reacting to the outside as a child and now?

When I was little, I did not react much to people, because I did not understand the idear of people communicating with me. When people called my name, I heard the sound and knew that it was my name, but that was the end. I didn't know that I was supposed to respond to that, so I didn't show any sign that I had heard anything at all. I don't remember much of my inner world. I remember mostly being focused on my repetitive activities, but I didn't have an inner world of colors and patterns. My lack of interaction with people was mostly me not having an instinct for interaction and not knowing what interactions were. Eventually, I learned what communication and interaction were, and I learned to speak spontaneously, so I became much moar responsive to people.

I lived mostly in a world of daydreams that were often quite detailed. So much so, that if someone talked to me, it felt like an intrusion. I would spend hours stimming & living in my complicated inner world.

Sincerely,
Matthew

I was exactly the same way. I remember relatives talking to me, trying to get a response out of me. I understood what they were saying. I was trying to grasp the whole situation, and just taking it all in, but for some reason I just did not feel any social responsibility to reply, like I was watching something unfold, but I was not really there.

I don't know if all children go through a phase like that or if it was being selectively mute or what.

I also remember a sensitivity to ordinary noises like traffic sounds. I don't know if cars and trucks were louder in the 50's, but when I heard one approaching I would be overcome with a feeling of dread and I would run to a corner of the porch and hide my face in the corner and the noise would get louder and louder until it sounded like a loud terrifying roar inside my head. It was absolute fear but I don't know why I was so afraid.

I remember my parents hovering over me trying to figure out what was wrong with me.

We eventually moved to a quieter more suburban neighborhood, and I got over it. Thunder storms were always pretty bad though, but they really are scary, right?

Thank you for replying.

I guess I did not understand the idea of communication as well that much as it did not got my focus onto it, but I do not know in how far I did communicate like being supposed to.
My repetitive actions were in the following of the wallpaper for example, as I was told it was a circus and there were this repetitive objects, like seven in a row and then repeating the seven in a row and repeating and repeating and repeating and I would spent hours staring at it. The first time I saw a real circus I was in a meltdown, because it did no match with what I knew from the wallpaper.

I liked the patterns in wallpaper too, and back in the 50's we always had wallpaper in every room. I also liked getting into the patterns in my grandparents Persian rug and my parents Blue Willow china. I even have my own collection of Blue Willow china now.

I also had a strange sensitivity to eyes. I remember once telling my mother I didn't feel well and she looked at me, asked me where I hurt and she seemed nervous and her eyes were bulging like they were going to pop right out of her head.

Ever since that time I couldn't tell her if I was sick because I couldn't deal with the bulging eyes. I remember her talking to her sisters on the phone telling them that I wouldn't even tell her when I was sick. She'd discover I had a fever or something but I didn't tell anyone.

I realize now that I don't interpret eye signals very well, usually I'm creeped out by eyes,

so maybe she was just feeling concern, and I interpreted her expression wrong.

Last edited by Marybird on 28 Jun 2012, 8:33 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I would spend most of my time in an imaginary world or looking intently at details around me and resent interruptions. I'm told I sometimes don't respond at all, but at the time I don't even hear them. I used to look at some detail of the environment, like the threads on a curtain, and turn it into an environment in my mind or just think about it until it was magnified in my mind into something very meaningful...
I still do this when life allows it!

I also have synesthesia with textures and sound, and I remember numbers as colors. I do sometimes feel as if I get absorbed in something to the point of being trapped, or being compulsive about it, but mostly I feel as though my inner world = swimming in water, or being at home. When I have to come out - to be in the correct mental state to communicate with most people - I can do it for a while but it wears me out, and I don't really like the real world all that much. But it is a sort of skill that can be learned and strengthened with practice.

Thank you for sharing your experiences!

I don't have synesthesia, but I've always been lost in daydreams ever since I was a young child. My imagination is has always been a huge mash-up of characters, settings, themes, music and dialogue from things like movies, TV shows and music that I enjoy.

I have a memory about childhood emotions and my father.

I was waking from a nap and looked out the window and saw my father just completing putting up a swing set. I went out into the yard and sat on one of the swings. I didn't say a word because I was so happy and there was nothing I could say to express that. My dad said "you know this swing set is for you, don't you?".

Then I was even happier because my dad understood how I felt. I continued to swing and not say a word and I felt so connected to my dad at that moment and that made me happier than anything.

But I lost that connection when I was a teenager and my dad accused me of not liking people. I adored him and didn't know why he didn't know that. I was so hurt that I destroyed some photos of me and him. Another time He said something that hurt my feelings and I cut his face out of my parents wedding picture.

I hurt myself more than anyone when I did that because I loved those pictures and I will never get them back. This has made me feel bad all my life.

Wow. My experiences are extremely similar to yours.

As a kid, I had a huge, vivid, detailed imagination and very heightened sensory perceptions as well as many kinds of synesthesia. I would also get lost in colours, patterns, and smells very easily and was often distracted in new environments. It was very hard for me to focus at school as I'd get lost in the posters on the walls. If I saw a picture of something, I could imagine music to go along with it, the characters involved acting out the scene, what their voices would sound like, etc.

The thing I still don't understand is why all of this faded away...and it started doing so around the age of 9-10. I got very depressed from the gradual loss of this world, and tried to savour it whenever possible by escaping further into my imaginary worlds, picking up the bits and pieces that were left. It faded completely by the time I was around 19-20. I still have minor memory-related synesthesia (colour/month and colour/person I've met) but not anything as obvious as the stuff I had as a kid. It greatly enhanced the way I perceived the world, and I often mourn for it.

My God, story of my own childhood. My parents couldn't understand it, didn't even make an effort to understand what I was doing, and just gave me hell for it. I wasn't allowed to find solace in the imaginary world where I went to find solace in the first place.

I have always been into looking for patterns in wallpaper, floors, repeated patterns in wood veneer panels, etc., but have never been "trapped" in them. I have also always had a very active daydream life, with a number of different daydream universes. Those I really do get absorbed in, and sometimes don't hear people when they speak to me while I am daydreaming.

I haven't experienced anything like that, but I'm curious what you mean by the link with near-death experiences. Could you elaborate on that?

Exactlly the same for me, and muc the same today really. It always feels like an intrusion when called out of it. I can get so absorbed in thoughts, daydreams and hyperfocusing on something (reading, playing, writing) that I shut out everything and it's a wonderful thing until someone drags me out of it, which is always very annoying.

OP, your childhood world of colours and shapes sounds wonderful!


I always hated my name, so I have at several times refused to react to anything but nicknames or even names I gave myself.
I don't find it natural to answer either, when called. I find it natural to await the next thing they're gonna say instead.

Thank you all for replying!

My inner world from my childhood matches a lot the descriptions which people experience in the moment of a near-death-experience. They write about landscapes and colours and sounds or music and a very calm feeling. I had this landscapes of colours in my inner daydream-world permanently, accompanied by sounds and music.
This made me love classical music a lot as I heard it in early childhood already in my "inner world".
Those people report about a "tunnel".
This is not in my experience.
Those people report about voices and human-like beings.
I never had voices in my "inner world", but human-like beings started to develop, like human-like shaped colours.
Those people report, that after such experience, they had never again a feeling of time.
I never had a feeling of time and do not have it, as my focus lies in the pictures and images in my head and though I see day changing into night, I still have no real inner definition for time, like the term "next week" is only a term for me, but I cannot get a feeling for the content of this term.
That one is hard to explain for me.

Now I have brought a book about near-death-experiences, which elaborates scientifically, which areas of the brain get affected in which way.