# Please State Your Earliest Memory, and Your Gender **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [October 13, 2008, 3:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-state-your-earliest-memory-and-your-gender/467668 "2008-10-13T03:22:48Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![fessie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/c37758/32.png) [@fessie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fessie)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2008, 3:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-state-your-earliest-memory-and-your-gender/467668/1 "2008-10-13T03:22:48Z")
I can remember things from before I turned 2 (I have a lot of memories from age 3 forward), and I am female. ---
**Author:** ![pendgwen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3da27b/32.png) [@pendgwen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pendgwen)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2008, 3:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-state-your-earliest-memory-and-your-gender/467668/2 "2008-10-13T03:43:23Z")
I have a snippet of memory of what I believe to be the apartment we lived in when I was 3. It’s just a visual of standing in a dark-ish hallway with a doorway to a room in ahead of me on the right with sunlight streaming into the hall from the room. It doesn’t match anything in my childhood home from age 3-8 and my mom tells me it does match the layout of the that apartment. I also remember and incident when I left a toy outside and it got ruined in the rain which also happened when we lived in the apartment. So nothing earlier than 3. I’m female. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Carrot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f0a364/32.png) [@Captain\_Carrot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Carrot)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2008, 4:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-state-your-earliest-memory-and-your-gender/467668/3 "2008-10-13T04:00:48Z")
[del]A split second[/del] No, I’ve lost that. I suppose 12, when I made a somewhat wry comment about another person’s statement, and somebody else laughed. I’m male. ---
**Author:** ![Mrs\_Johnson](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7cd45c/32.png) [@Mrs\_Johnson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mrs_Johnson)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2008, 4:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-state-your-earliest-memory-and-your-gender/467668/4 "2008-10-13T04:31:35Z")
I recall the color and texture of the carpet and vaguely remember the layout of the living room in a rent-house we lived in when I was 1. When I was 2 or 3 I had a nightmare that the neighbor’s German shepherd was chasing me through the backyard, into the house and he cornered me in the bedroom. I fell onto a piece of exercise equipment when I was 3 and had to get stitches on my nose. I don’t remember the accident, but I do remember the doctor giving me a little red teddy bear. I’m female. ---
**Author:** ![MOIDALIZE](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e274bd/32.png) [@MOIDALIZE](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MOIDALIZE)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2008, 4:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-state-your-earliest-memory-and-your-gender/467668/5 "2008-10-13T04:46:04Z")
My mother gave me a bath in the kitchen sink. Afterwards, my aunt and uncle came to pick me up and take me to their house for the night. I stared at my sandals and cried because I missed my mom. Not sure how old I was, but I was still small enough to get a sink bath. Younger than 3 I imagine. I am male. ---
**Author:** ![Time\_Like\_Tears](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/df705f/32.png) [@Time\_Like\_Tears](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Time_Like_Tears)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2008, 4:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-state-your-earliest-memory-and-your-gender/467668/6 "2008-10-13T04:49:11Z")
I remember quite vividly taking a bath in the tub with my mom when she was very pregnant with my younger sister. Sis and I are 22 months apart. I am a girl. ---
**Author:** ![Larry\_Borgia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/larry_borgia/32/156_2.png) [@Larry\_Borgia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Larry_Borgia)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2008, 4:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-state-your-earliest-memory-and-your-gender/467668/7 "2008-10-13T04:53:03Z")
I swear I have some memories from our first time in Turkey, but we left before I was two and they’re very vague. My earliest clear memory is being surprised by a cobra in India when I was about four or five. ---
**Author:** ![Ruby](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/13edae/32.png) [@Ruby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ruby)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2008, 4:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-state-your-earliest-memory-and-your-gender/467668/8 "2008-10-13T04:54:30Z")
I have no recollection before the age of 5. I was in kindergarten and remember the teacher telling us we had to take a nap every afternoon. A nap! I was aghast at the idea that you took a nap in school. Naps were for babies. ---
**Author:** ![elelle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f0a364/32.png) [@elelle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elelle)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2008, 5:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-state-your-earliest-memory-and-your-gender/467668/9 "2008-10-13T05:07:09Z")
Very distinct memory of getting upright and walking, somewhere between one and two. Dad was encouraging me, I got up and wobbly, in our living room, remember the fireplace bricks as _not good_. I can see in my mind my Dad smiling and saying that the walking thang was good, encouraging, and moving toward him. Oh, I’m a gal. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2008, 5:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-state-your-earliest-memory-and-your-gender/467668/10 "2008-10-13T05:08:23Z")
A memory fragment of when I was in my crib. It was summertime, the windows were up and I could hear neighborhood kids playing basketball nearby. Couldn’t have been much more than a year or so old, if that. I’m a guy. ---
**Author:** ![Inner\_Stickler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inner_stickler/32/318_2.png) [@Inner\_Stickler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inner_Stickler)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2008, 5:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-state-your-earliest-memory-and-your-gender/467668/11 "2008-10-13T05:15:50Z")
I remember being held up by my mom to wave hello to my dad through the living room window when he came home from work. I must have been around 3. I am male. ---
**Author:** ![ParentalAdvisory](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/53a042/32.png) [@ParentalAdvisory](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ParentalAdvisory)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2008, 5:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-state-your-earliest-memory-and-your-gender/467668/12 "2008-10-13T05:19:58Z")
… ---
**Author:** ![Roderick\_Femm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/roderick_femm/32/14875_2.png) [@Roderick\_Femm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roderick_Femm)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2008, 5:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-state-your-earliest-memory-and-your-gender/467668/13 "2008-10-13T05:20:10Z")
I’m a male. My earliest memory is the day we moved into our new house, I was 2 years and 7 months old. I remember getting out of the car, seeing a couple of slightly older kids next door, and then going up to the stairs leading up to the house. I have a number of memories of being too short to see the top of the kitchen table (what is that, about 30 inches or so?). I don’t know how old I would have been at that age, but I was always tall for my age. Roddy ---
**Author:** ![Leah\_M](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/57b2e6/32.png) [@Leah\_M](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leah_M)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2008, 5:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-state-your-earliest-memory-and-your-gender/467668/14 "2008-10-13T05:29:53Z")
I can recall getting pictures taken with my baby sister when I was about 1 1/2 or 2. I also recall swimming in a little plastic pool shaped like a frog, when I was about the same age. I’m female. ---
**Author:** ![erleichda](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/4da419/32.png) [@erleichda](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/erleichda)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2008, 7:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-state-your-earliest-memory-and-your-gender/467668/15 "2008-10-13T07:51:34Z")
I can remember handing my dad tools while he worked on a car. I must have been around two at the time. I actually have quite a few memories of living in Seattle and I know that we moved when I was about three or four. I am female. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2008, 9:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-state-your-earliest-memory-and-your-gender/467668/16 "2008-10-13T09:09:02Z")
I have memories that I know are from age 2 or 3 but not exactly when, or in which order they took place. Female. ---
**Author:** ![Mops](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mops/32/16494_2.png) [@Mops](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mops)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2008, 9:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-state-your-earliest-memory-and-your-gender/467668/17 "2008-10-13T09:38:17Z")
Visiting my mother and my new brother in hospital. 3 years 9 months. Male. ---
**Author:** ![Dunderman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ecb155/32.png) [@Dunderman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dunderman)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2008, 9:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-state-your-earliest-memory-and-your-gender/467668/18 "2008-10-13T09:41:36Z")
The oldest memory that I’m sure is actually mine as opposed to something people told me and I made up a false memory of is seeing my babysitter looking out the window as my mother drives to work. It happened before I was two. I have a rather vivid but impossible memory of my aunt being pregnant with my cousin. My cousin was born less than 14 months before me. Male. ---
**Author:** ![flodnak](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/838e76/32.png) [@flodnak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/flodnak)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2008, 9:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-state-your-earliest-memory-and-your-gender/467668/19 "2008-10-13T09:51:47Z")
The oldest memory I am absolutely sure of was standing at the back door of our house and watching what I remembered as chocolate milk flowing by and out the alley. Then someone picked me up. My mother tells me this was when Hurricane Agnes moved through our town; the “chocolate milk” was run-off from the heavy rain, carrying a lot of mud with it, and I was picked up because I was too entranced by the running water to hear my parents calling me. We were going upstairs in case the water got higher. Fortunately it didn’t get high enough to flood our first floor, although the cellar was a mess. This was about two months before my third birthday. I have another memory I’m less sure of, of standing in my crib and looking out at a blue jay perched on the fence. There are two problems: I couldn’t see out of the window from my crib; and the fence was so far away I shouldn’t have been able to see it as clearly as I remember. Still, the memory is so vivid there may have been _something_ to it. I moved out of my crib on my second birthday. I’m female. ---
**Author:** ![Icerigger](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/icerigger/32/432_2.png) [@Icerigger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Icerigger)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2008, 10:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-state-your-earliest-memory-and-your-gender/467668/20 "2008-10-13T10:00:31Z")
When my baby brother was born, I would have been 2 years 11 months, I am male. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-state-your-earliest-memory-and-your-gender/467668.md?page=2)