My Papa passed away a few months ago. His name was John Manuel and he was a great person. He was a talented musician, a family man, and an all around fun guy. I have a lot of awesome memories of us hanging out and enjoying time together. I bring him up because my post is about the Short term memory. He was the first example that came to mind when I learned about the different types of memory and how they are separate from each other. It is amazing how we can have great functionality with short term memory, and on the other hand have horrible functionality with long term memory, or vice versa.
In the last few years, he was diagnosed with dementia. As his condition progressed, so did his struggle with his short term memory. However, interesting enough, his long term memory was still spot on. He could recall life events from his childhood and still play the guitar and sing like he was 35 again. However, if I were at his house hanging out with him, he would ask me literally 20 times if I wanted something to eat or when I had arrived there even though I had been sitting and talking with him for an hour. I would always answer him, then start talking about something else with him.
Because of the key differences of brain functionality and how certain memories are stored and recalled, my Papa had a sharp and functioning long term memory, while his shirt term memory suffered. His working memory which processed and decided how to use his short term information is what was not functioning properly.
The brain is amazing with the way it works. It seems like I could be sad that my Papa lost his STM, and to an extent, I am. But I am grateful that his LTM and other areas of his brain still had great functionality up until his final days. I am glad that God, some mad scientist, or mother nature (whomever it may be) designed our brains in such away that we don’t have to lose all functionality when certain areas take irreparable damage.
-Clayton Munoz
I am sorry for your loss, I too lost my father to dementia, but he regressed to basically a happy toddler. His speech, long term memories, and in the end the ability to walk were removed by the dementia. I liked your blog and agree that “The brain is amazing with the way it works” and I would be curious if we could of gotten fMRI’s to see the areas affected by the dementia and how different areas were affected.
I would like to start off by saying that I am sorry for your loss, I know that it is not easily especially if it is a loved one. My grandmother was diagnosed with dementia, and it is really hard for everyone, it brought me to tears when she could not remember who I was. It was even harder watching her go through her days just getting worse and not being able to remember the good times we had especially when it came to the holidays like the fourth of July when we had a get together and had a party. The fireworks were always the best part because they were big and loud but sadly, she doesn’t remember all of that just the time when we dressed up as the statue of liberty and sang songs but unfortunately that’s when I was very little and a long time ago.
I would like to start of saying that I am sorry for you loss, I know that it is not easily especially if it is a love one. My grandmother was diagnosed with dementia and it is really hard for everyone, it brought me to tears when she could not remember who I was.
Hey there Clayton! For starters, I would like to offer my condolences for the loss of your grandfather John. Based off of your descriptions, he does sound like a fun and awesome person! Considering the loss was rather recent, I am sure conducting a post about him must not have been easy. However, I am grateful you did. Describing how dementia can specifically captivate one area of memory is quite astonishing. Much like your amazement on the complexity of the mind, I find myself just as intrigued. Dementia is not only difficult on the person experiencing it, but it can also be a very heavy load to bare for close family members. This is because they are experiencing its effects as well. Much like you mentioned how he would ask you if you ate anything several times, in which you would have to politely regurgitate the same information consistently.
Ironically I can relate to your post, since my grandfather has been gradually losing his memory, which I can only assume is due to Alzheimer’s disease. When I really started to notice this memory change was when he went to take my sister and I out to breakfast about two years ago. He began driving us to McDonalds, and once we reached a traffic light he asked if we make a left or a right. Instantly I announced, “a right!” full of confidence. However, much to my surprise he laughed at me and began arguing. I had driven to this specific location many times and knew for a fact it was a right, but when he began insisting that I was wrong, I was at a loss. Luckily he wanted to humor me and made a right, but when he saw that McDonalds was where I said ,he seemed shocked. I tried to convince myself that he just hadn’t been up this way in a while since he lives two hours away. Although I ignored this initial experience, later on another situation happened that confirmed my suspicions. This was because he was telling a funny story about how my dad went out to his van and screamed like a girl when he saw a bear by it. Everyone was laughing, but when my grandfather said it happened a week ago there was utter silence in the room. This was because the bear story actually happened well over ten years ago. This was the point in which we realized his memory was slowly fading.
The aspect of memory is far from simple. Knowing that short-term memory can be lost, while maintaining long-term memory or vice versa is truly an interesting phenomenon in psychology. Since components of memory don’t act solely by themselves but rely on control processes to blend the structure of a memory, this makes it even more fascinating how they can detach from one another. One form of long-term memory is “procedural memory”, that allows “our abilities and “muscle coordination” to still function (Goldstein,2011). This seems similar to John playing the guitar. I have heard that learning to play the guitar is a challenging instrument to master, did he ever share with you with any tips on how to play?
Since long-term memory “can hold a large amount of information for years or even decades” this seems to keep the past relevant (Goldstein ,2011). While on the other hand working memory in the quite briefer and less dependable. Our course used digit-span to emphasize the small containment of what our short-term memories can hold. Although short-term memory may have its limitations, I saw a video in which short-term memory was truly put to the test. The video entailed a young man named Stephen Wiltshire who suffers from Autism. During a one-hour helicopter ride over the city of Rome, Stephen was able to retain the entire city by memory, and draw it afterwards. Not only were his drawing skills exceptional, but the specificities of his drawing were nearly perfect. He recalled the entire city of Rome from memory after only a one-hour airplane ride, and zero references while drawing. The accuracy of the drawing compared with the actual city was nearly identical. He recalled the exact number of columns on the colosseum. In fact, he drew it so precisely that it was deemed “practically a blueprint” (Alnomad,2006). Overall memory is quite puzzling, and whether its dementia or photographic memory it continues to impress psychologists and humanity.
References:
Alnomad. (2006). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jVqRT_kCOLI
Goldstein, B. (2011). “Cognitive psychology: Connecting mind, research and everyday experience” (4th ed.). Wadsworth, Inc.
Clayton, I am so sorry for your loss. I know it is not an easy feat to lose someone you love. Watching someone lose their memory over time is hard, I went through it twice with two separate family members who had cancer at two different times. My nana had leukemia and she had no issues with long term memory like remembering things from when she was young or from when I was a baby. However, she would forget to eat or wash or drink anything. Most of her basic life functions had to be continually told to her for her to remember. I think it’s quite lovely how you pointed out aspects of him and his personality instead of just focusing on him being sick. I feel like when people are so close to a situation like that, they tend to forget all the good things about a person. Memory and the brain are very interesting and genuinely amaze me. It is shocking what the brains functionality is capable of.