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Memories have brought us to where we are and allow us to anticipate where we’ll go next.
But what if we had none and, further, couldn’t make any?
What if we were drifting in decades of darkness with no idea what happened last or what was
soon to come?
Memories are what anchor us in time and to the people around us; without them, we become
lonely, lost, and confused.
For Clive Wearing, amnesia is living death.
Learn about his burden with the worst case of amnesia ever in this episode of The Infographics
Show, The Man With the 30 Second Memory.
To understand the life of Clive Wearing, we must first understand memory.
It begins with what we experience.
While we interact with the world around us, the neurons, or nerve cells of our brains,
are busy firing away to make sense of what we touch, taste, hear, feel, and see.
And, it turns out, these cells play a crucial role in our ability to remember these later
on.
When electrodes were placed on the brains of study subjects as they watched part of
a show, for instance, firing from one neuron to another could be seen in the hippocampus
and cortex of their brains.
When the subjects later recalled the show, it reactivated the neurons that had fired
as they watched it the first time.
It is believed we must recall past events to strengthen neural pathways, or they will
not transfer well to long-term memory.
On the other hand, if we do revisit an event, it will become both vivid and rich in detail
as well as easy to recollect.
The same is true for the brain in general, as it made up of muscle.
If it’s used often it grows strong; in absence of exercise, it grows weak.
Of course, over time, like the other muscles in the body, its function will decline as
part of the natural course of life.
However, while slowed activity or lapses in memory can be normal with age, a drastic loss
of days to years of our past is not.
Neither is the inability to remember anything new.
Sometimes this happens when things go wrong in the brain, particularly with the hippocampus
or cortex.
The hippocampus sits in the temporal lobe, deep within the center of the brain and helps
with the formation of memory.
In addition to this, the hippocampus is where conversion from short-term to long-term memory
takes place.
However, it is in the cortex where long-term memories are stored.
As a result, damage to the hippocampus may prevent new memories from being made while
damage to the cortex impacts memories made before.
The damage to these structures or the areas immediately around them may result in a condition
called amnesia.
All kinds of amnesia are characterized by some type of memory loss.
Some may be unable to recall past memories, others may fail to make new memories, and
many have a limited to nonexistent concept of the future.
Things that are forgotten include details of what they have done, things that have taken
place, people they knew or loved, and facts they learned or were taught.
Often, despite this, most retain a basic understanding of who they are and can still perform procedural
functions, such as riding a bicycle.
Language ability is often intact as well.
However, symptoms vary by individual and circumstance as well as the type of amnesia involved.
There are several kinds, including retrograde and anterograde amnesia, among others.
Retrograde amnesia is a loss of the past.
Often, not all memories vanish completely; generally, the most recent ones are lost while
older ones may either remain, or in the case of a degenerative condition, are the last
to disappear.
This phenomenon is known as Ribot’s Law.
It takes place because newer memories have weaker connections, while older memories have
had more time to be recalled and grow stronger.
Those with this condition may still make new memories despite their inability to recall
the past before the brain injury took place.
Semantics are often preserved, such as what color is which or what word means what and
skills or procedural abilities may remain as well.
Events that took place, or episodic memories, however, will be forgotten.
Retrograde amnesia does not occur because of damage to the hippocampus but to the prefrontal
cortex or other locations where long-term memories are sometimes stored.
Causes of retrograde amnesia include hitting the head, having a stroke, periods without
oxygen, growths in the brain, brain infection, or alcohol abuse.
In the case of Harrison Ford, engine failure and a subsequent plane crash left him with
serious injuries requiring hospitalization.
He could not explain what had happened before the crash due to the loss of memories surrounding
the event.
Because he could not remember what took place prior to getting hurt, but continues to know
what happened after, this would be an instance of retrograde amnesia.
Another well-known individual, Scott Bolzan, suffered from retrograde amnesia as well.
In fact, his is one of the most severe cases ever known.
After falling and hitting his head 46 years of his memories were erased.
However, though past memories will likely stay lost, he can make new ones today and
from now on.
Anterograde amnesia is different from retrograde amnesia as it is a loss of one’s present.
Those with this condition can no longer make memories of what is happening and therefore
have no recollection of what just took place.
This amnesia is due to problems with the making and then storing of memories and often involves
the hippocampus.
Memories that are lost because of anterograde amnesia are mostly based on fact, and many
will retain procedures or skills.
Further, the ability of those with anterograde amnesia to remember long-term memories often
remains unchanged.
Anterograde amnesia occurs for many reasons.
It may be the result of a concussion or physical damage as well as oxygen deprivation, epilepsy,
or emotional trauma.
It may also develop because of benzodiazepine drugs, alcohol, or injury to the hippocampus
or medial temporal lobe.
Oddly enough, it has been caused by a root canal as well.
Such was the case of Patient WO.
This man was unable to make new memories after the procedure, and is stuck in March of 2005,
on the day of his visit to the dentist.
While this cannot be easily explained, some believe his neurons were negatively impacted
in some way.
Another man, known as Patient EP, developed anterograde amnesia as well.
His was the result of a viral infection that led to widespread inflammation and the destruction
of his hippocampus.
As a result, he could form no more memories.
While retrograde or anterograde amnesia are devastating enough on their own, Clive Wearing
has both.
In fact, Clive has what has been defined as the worst case of amnesia ever known.
He was once a successful musicologist, pianist, and conductor until March of 1985.
This was when he came down with an infection known as herpes encephalitis.
The virus caused massive damage throughout his brain and, unfortunately, he has not been
the same since.
While Clive can understand what he sees and hears, their meaning is lost in an instant.
His memory, which ranges from seven to thirty seconds, is a moment in time, sometimes spanning
the space of two blinks of an eye.
When he speaks, he will have forgotten the sentence that came before; if he answers a
question, by the time he’s done he will have forgotten what he was responding to.
He has next to no recollections at all, though he has mentioned some childhood events as
well as some things he remembers as a student in school.
Both were long ago.
Before the present moment there are just decades of nothing; only darkness and a blank void.
In fact, Clive believes that before now he was unconscious, in a coma, or for all intents
and purposes, dead.
To find some continuity in his life he started a journal hoping it would help.
But minute by minute he would write “I am awake” or “I am conscious” or “This
time properly awake” or “this time completely awake” while crossing out the entry from
before.
It did not take him long to create hundreds and hundreds of such pages.
Clive cannot make inferences to fill in the blanks or recognize words in his own writing
that he made moments ago himself.
In moments of despair he has told his wife Deborah that he is entirely incapable of thought.
Over time Clive’s mood has improved, though his condition has not.
While he may alternate between happiness and depression, during the worst of times his
complaint is the same: that he hasn’t heard anything, seen anything, touched anything,
or smelled anything that he can remember.
He says life is like a long night spanning years without an end and without him being
conscious of anything in it.
But he has found joy at times through his music and through the love he still feels
for his wife.
His wife Deborah is the only person he can recognize, though he cannot recall her name.
Each time he sees her, he gets overjoyed as he believes that it has been years.
When she leaves he has been known to call her more than once on her way home asking
her to visit, forgetting she just has.
Yet their love endures, strong as it ever was, despite it all.
The reasons for this are somewhat of a mystery, as emotional memory is not well understood.
To Clive, it is a much needed gift.
In an existence like death, Deborah gives him life.
It is Deborah who is his one and only joy apart from music, a passion they both always
have and will continue to share.
An former pianist, when Clive is asked if he can play a song, he will respond that he
cannot and never has.
However, when at the piano he can play and do so well.
Similarly, though he cannot tell you how to get to his home he can unbuckle his seatbelt
indicating that he knows he is near.
He knows his way around his home and can even prepare a beverage to enjoy.
But unless he is actually doing these things, he is unaware he can and could not explain
them if he was asked.
Clive is a man who is lost in time; with little to no knowledge of his past and who forgets
his present virtually as it takes place.
Retrograde and anterograde amnesia have trapped him in only a sliver of consciousness.
However, love endures and he holds tightly on to his wife and to his music as a source
of comfort.
Without these he is lost without a past in an ever-changing and confusing present and
with more of the same to come.
Unfortunately, Clive was not the first to suffer both the loss of his past and an inability
to remember his present.
Patient HM, famous among the medical community, had these difficulties too.
He was 27 years old when he underwent surgery for seizures and the hippocampus from each
temporal lobe was removed.
Afterwards, he could make no new memories.
He also lost his memories of the past but this was thought to be due to his seizures
and use of antiepileptic drugs.
Like Clive, he forgot who he was talking to or what about almost right away.
While he could both draw and practice drawing to improve, he wasn’t aware he had drawn
before, much like Clive and his ability to play the piano though he was unaware that
he knew how.
While Clive could remember some of his childhood, the same was true for Patient HM.
In this instance he was stuck at the age of 16.
Mentally, he remained that old until he died.
The importance of memories is clear.
If structures of the brain are damaged enough it will impact our lives forever.
We may, in fact, believe we are no longer really living at all.
Due to his amnesia, Clive exists in an often-empty world yet has periods of joy as well as distress.
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With his wife and his music, what do you think of Clive’s quality of life?
Let us know in the comments!
Also, be sure to check out our other video called What If You Smoke 1000 Cigarettes At
the Same Time!
Thanks for watching, and, as always, don’t forget to like, share, and subscribe.
See you next time!