What remains when your memory fades

What is who we are? Is that Memory– Names, dates, stories we have? Or is it more elemental and more permanent?

This question has been going on for years, from the lab bench to the bedside, from the daughter to the doctor. But until I saw people I loved lose their memories, I began to see something unexpected. When memories fade away, something essential still remains. love. Imagination. Front of the audience. These are not just the things left behind. They may be the very basis for who we are.

When memory loops and language fail

I remember that my grandmother’s sharp intelligence slowly darkened under the weight of dementia. Her questions looped. Her gaze was once bright and recognized, but was open. Later, during medical training, I stood by a woman who had an early development of Alzheimer’s disease, asking the same questions three times in one go. These were not merely clinical observations. They were heartbreaking.

Then my mother got diagnosed. ALS – A merciless illness that silences the body in front of the mind. I watched her lose the muscles carrying her voice, breath, her smile. But even if her body failed, something unwavering endured. Her imagination. Her presence. Her love. She could no longer speak, but her gaze was warm. Her eyes still sparked with mischief. I began to ask: Will imagination be the throbbing of consciousness?

Science is full of mystery

I spent decades immersed in biochemistry, molecular biophysics, and medicine, looking for how my self connects. but sorrow I personally made that inquiry.

I remember staring at a microscope with newly discovered human embryonic stem cells. They were shining like constellations. This is a latent glow while still being forment. Among them were instructions from the body, the brain, and the beating heart. And I thought maybe it was a flicker of consciousness. It felt like I was watching the universe write its first sentence.

A detour to psychedelics – and deeper knowledge

When the pandemic quieted the world, those old questions came back. In tranquility, I read How to change your mindand something had broken dormant. I turned to psychedelics not as an escape but as a lens for consciousness itself. What happens when you go outside of your normal consciousness? What happens when known dissolution occurs?

In these altered states I came across a kind of knowledge that is not bound by memory. I didn’t remember, I was aware. A long distant insight was clicked together. It made me wonder: is memory just one expression of something deeper? Are love and imagination the structures under consciousness?

Recent research In a psychedelic state, it shows ego boundary It may break up while a strong sense of connection remains, suggesting that self-importance may be related rather than self-autobiographical.

Rethinking your own thread

We often treat memories like filing cabinets. But if it’s like a thread, what about what connects us not only to the past but to each other? And when that thread begins to fray, perhaps it is the imagination that brings us together: the ability to draw, create, and feel.

Studying the brain’s default mode network– Linked to memory, self-reflection, imaginative thinking – highlights the role of Creativity maintenance Identity It means. a 2021 Trial We found that a single dose of psilocybin enhanced both convergent and divergent thinking. I experienced this firsthand after the guided session. It was not an invention. That was recognition.

Forgetting exists in the spectrum, from misnamed names to vanished sense of self. still New research It suggests that emotional memory and social reactivity often persist in dementia, even if verbal communication is lost. Some theory We suggest that the self may not be preserved, but patterns may occur – weaved from perception, embodiment, and relationships.

Final Threshold: Feel

You can track brain waves and map what fire is, but you still don’t know what consciousness is or where it lives. Science can outline perceptions. But it still cannot touch on its essence.

Still, I believe this. Even if you can’t see the faint light of what happened before, what remains may be the most important thing. glance. smile. A whisper of existence. love.

They may be called to view them differently. Trusting that value has never been a day off Cognition By yourself. That dignity is revealed not through memory, but through connections. Even when the lights are dark, even when something endures, it is not always visible, not always naming, and still feels. in Nervous system At a glance. In my mind that continues to appear. With the web of web holding us in place.

But when even that connection is lost, when no one meets the gaze, when no one remembers the name, and the thread of existence doesn’t snap?

Has it disappeared?

For that person, it may feel like it will fade away. It’s not a lack of memory, it’s a lack of feeling. Without relational mirroring, the self runs the risk of disbanding existentially as well as neurologically, without someone holding their dignity in place. A life that still exists may be mistaken for someone who is already gone.

So, if we found ourselves with a loved one who no longer remembers your name, what have we lost? Listen, what can we still feel together?

You can still connect even if you don’t recognize it. Through the tone. Through the touch. Through a quiet claim that it will appear.

I’m not just believing in this. I lived it.
And that knowledge is a respect.

Please email me jfontana@treathumanity.org