A reading of my article – Aphantasia, Imagine That!
(c) K Wicks
aphantasia
Aphantasia, Imagine That!
A concept that most people (apparently 98%) may find quite far removed from their ordinary thought process. How many times have you heard a sentence start with or have said yourself ‘now imagine’… Well, some people can’t. Literally.
A difference in ability only ‘discovered’ or noticed in 1880, by academic all-rounder Sir Francis Galton, but not named or studied further in much detail until 2015 when it became Aphantasia. A literal translation from the Greek meaning, lack of fantasy. (A = lack of, Phantasia = Fantasy).
Which in itself it’s a bit of a misnomer, it is not a lack of fantasy or imagination, but a lack of visual imagery.
I personally had not heard of this until 2 years ago, when we discovered my husband has it. Before this, we had what I thought were general communication issues, despite spending most of our time together and talking frequently about a range of subjects. I couldn’t work out where the differences in opinions and thought processes were coming from as they seemed quite illogical to me, and he is not illogical, so I knew there was something else. At first I thought it was me, I questioned myself and my brain about what and why and I couldn’t see it. I am fascinated by thought processes and how they impact our lives and actions and make us who we are, so wouldn’t leave this one alone.
The main point of issue seemed to be for me, the fact that I read and write fiction and him not thinking it had any relevant place in society. I wanted to know why, really know how someone could think this of something I felt was so fundamentally necessary. It took many hours over a number of days for me to finally ask the right questions (trying not to make him feel like a test subject), coming to the conclusion of what was going on. I put forward the concept he had not considered or realised. I explained that when I read a book, my brain makes pictures up to accompany the words. Or that I can replay movies I have seen mostly if seen enough times.
“You see pictures in your head! That sounds like witchcraft to me. I can’t think of anything more alien”
And we had it. We had found the difference that explained why he thought fiction was pointless. But that was the tip of iceberg really of what was meant to be a simple explanation of why he didn’t see things the way I did. With a little bit of internet research I found the name. Aphantasia. That didn’t make it easier it turned out. I felt guilt at finding this out, of having to explain to someone why they were different, how they were different and try and support how they were feeling, when I couldn’t possibly understand. But it started to make sense. Enjoyment from fictional books that required you to imagine and picture the scene, are completely lost on him.
We did see the world differently, not just from a personal perspective, but with separate realities too. That might sound a bit dramatic, but it was and still is. Mine possibly not even entirely reality when I gave it more thought. I had always been so sure of my way of thinking, it bought into question for me, the reliability of a brain that can conjure images, pretend at will and change visual memories. Could non-aphantasiac people be trusted at all? My husband asked me one question when I confirmed it is believed most people ‘see images’ in their head. “So when people are driving, sometimes they aren’t thinking about driving and are imagining other stuff? That’s terrifying”.
And it is really.
But changing the way I think about things has helped, I didn’t expect him to as he isn’t wrong in the way he thinks, but neither am I. But I can imagine what it’s like to not imagine – it’s as close as I can get but I see the irony. What I previously saw as difficult behaviour by my standard, wasn’t when I saw it from his standard. That’s where our realities will always be different, and always were, but with a new twist now.
He is better at directions and orientation, his memory is more accurate than mine, he learns quickly, he is focused. But on the downside, he gets frustrated easily, he can’t ‘picture’ me if I am not in the room. There are pros and cons to each thought process, as there usually is with any situation or way of being to a person trying to navigate their way through life.
But while we as a species continue to study memory, thought, ideas and who we are as people, it was inevitable to me we would find variations. I just didn’t realise what societal implications those variations would have, on both sides. There is a much broader issue here compared to what I first believed.
(c) K Wicks
Hyperphantasia, A Down Side – article reading
Dreams
DREAMS
(This is a chapter from my book Meeting in the Middle of Nowhere, link below).
Another reason for our differences arose shortly after we met. The subject of dreams came up and he reacted a bit strangely about it in my view. He doesn’t have them, none that can be remembered in any way at least, but found it bizarre that I did so much. And that I could replay them the next day. I have them every day, sometimes recurring, but mostly all dramatic and tiring. I had spent years despairing of them sometimes, unable to shake them upon waking. Having them follow me throughout the day, the feeling, the memory, the tiredness. Sleep is often not refreshing for me, but because my brain feels so overworked everyday just by thinking, I require sleep. I cannot escape it.
The whole concept of the above is as foreign as it could get to him when I broke it down. Why would you go through the motions of things that aren’t real when you’re asleep? All I could do was agree, it is weird and I cannot explain that bit, in fact, I have been trying to for a while now.
I watch a lot of horror (or at least have done), and often used to have apocalyptic dreams involving zombies, alien invasion or some such drama. Even when I hadn’t watched the films for quite some time, they could come back any time. Or that is how it looks on the outside. It’s easy to say that our dreams come directly from what we watch – and I have considered it, but what I go through is usually relevant to real life rather than fantasy. Anxiety, stress, worry, fear, anger – all the things we are taught to suppress in our daily lives. They just happen to manifest by way of ridiculous scenarios.
Again, to someone who does not have dreams, or visual replay of any kind, that is crazy talk. But to me it’s normal now, not enjoyable, but a bit more controllable. The trick is, not to get so wound up or anxious in real life, because it will follow me into sleep. There is no respite or escape in sleep, my brain does not shut down, and it just goes somewhere else and takes me with it.
As I got to my early twenties before I knew how to drive, I began to have driving dreams. I wasn’t even learning and had no immediate plan to, but as it was something I knew would come up, it began to feature. My mother didn’t drive and neither did my two older siblings so I had nothing to gauge it on either, so maybe that added to it. The amusing thing about those ones though, was that I had no idea how to drive, so in the dreams the car would usually roll into a hedge or down a hill. Expressing to me my main concern was that I didn’t know how to, rather than I would have to learn. There was a partly funny, partly scary one though, where I was driving up a hill so steep that the car just tipped back on itself. So I will admit, when going up steep hills thereafter, my brain would default to a mild fleeting feeling of panic, remembering that dream.
Another that featured a few times, were teeth dreams. Occasionally I would have a dream where some of my teeth fell out. If you read any of the dream interpretation books, they say ones like that mean you are worried about money. Personally as I always had a dentist appointment booked around that time and have a fear of the dentist, I put it down to that. Although once you know how much you have to pay for your dental treatment, that could definitely give you teeth-related money dreams!
But as a depressed teenager cut off from the real world by my own mind, I found day-dreaming to be my saviour. I found living with my mother’s weirdness very draining and my only escape was to wander off in my head. I would dream of normality, try to imagine my future, what I wanted to be, dream of being brave and impetuous. Anything that could distract me from my actual reality, I read books, drew pictures, watched films, embroidered, wrote diaries, cleaned, walked our dogs (something that helped me get over agoraphobia), anything I could to not have to stop and be where I was.
I must admit, there is still a similarity as I do not have a quiet mind. But as an adult, I don’t need to daydream anymore, because I can change what I want if I need to. If something in my life is worrying me or is wrong, I can sort it out. I didn’t have that luxury when I was 15, so dreaming was my temporary way out.
The study of sleep and dreams has been going on for an age and I am aware there are people who don’t dream at all. Or some who don’t remember them in any way who do visualise, so this is a varied subject whatever your thought process or visualising capabilities. There are also the extreme sleep conditions, where people have night terrors and actually act out the fear or anxiety being experienced. Where dreams and nightmares can take on a life of their own. There really are some strange things going on inside our heads, whether we are in control or not, and even whether we are awake or not. That can be quite a scary concept.
(c) K Wicks
Hyperphantasia and horror
This is one of my articles about Aphantasia and Hyperphantasia, and although it’s not the only thing influencing what people are into and whether they enjoy horror, it appears to be a big factor in the difference between myself and my husband and our interests (or lack thereof), in fiction and in particular, horror.
My other article Fiction is Pointless describes how we stumbled upon the difference and what it led to. But I speculate further into the area of horror fiction because I find it interesting and wonder whether it might help other people understand some of the mechanisms going on in mind which shape us. Personally, I had nightmares as a kid and was afraid of things I couldn’t see as well as the things I could. I was probably traumatized by films like any other kid, or so I thought, and watched a fair amount of horror where I could growing up in the 80’s – a time when censorship was moving through and they became sought after and a right of passage for a time.
I kept a lot of my fears to myself, just going through them quietly and possible just presuming lots of people would be effected in the same way. Another article Hyperphantasia, a down side went into a more detailed look at one film in particular that chose to feature and repeat for me as a recurring issue, and one I couldn’t hide, so it was became a family joke that I was scared of sharks. You may have guessed from that which film I’m talking about.
So when we discovered the difference that one of us doesn’t visualise in mind (Aphantasia), and one of us does (Hyperphantasia), I mentally went through it and imagined being someone without pictures in mind, without an internal monolgue or replay going on. Speculating on and how that might affect my interactions, thought processes and general day to day life. The differences were massive, and maybe I shouldn’t have analysed it so much but it’s what I do, so no stone was left unturned as you might say. Then I wrote an entire book on it, steering away temporarily from my fictional writing to write my first non fictional book (link below).
I asked only a few questions to delve into the affect horror films may have had on someone with Aphantasia.
Q: So you have never had a nightmare?
A: No
Q: Were you ever afraid of the dark?
A: Why would I be afraid of the dark?
Q: Did the concept of anything or the tension in a film scare you?
A: Why would I be scared of something I can’t see?
There didn’t seem to be the need for many more questions on that, it was a logical response that summed it up perfectly. I won’t lie though, I was pretty shocked to know some people were like that, and more to the point, that I wasn’t. It’s taken me decades to manage my thoughts, the visualising and replay mechanisms without knowing what they were or why they were there. And once I did, it turned out I had been trying to understand them while also at the same time feeding them. I wish I had know many years ago about Hyperphantasia because I would have known to better filter my input, or understand sooner that what I read or watch, will stay with me, wanted or not.
There is still much to understand about what our brains are up to and how they may help or hinder us along the way, so the research continues…
(c) K Wicks
Autumn reads
“So you see pictures in your head? That sounds like witchcraft to me!”
And to someone who doesn’t visualise in mind, or have an inner monolgue, it really did.
It was from there I asked more questions and discovered one of us has Hyperhantasia and the other has Aphantasia, and what followed was quite a game changer.
(c) K Wicks
Not on the same page
There are many reason people think differently to one another, and I spend a fair amount of any spare time I have speculating and assessing why that is. Along the way and within my investigative nature, I discovered that my husband was Aphantasic. Meaning he does not have mental imagery annd doesn’t visualise anything in mind. And the reason we stumbled upon this revelation, was because it transpired that I over visualise. Hyperphantasia they have called it. And it was through this difference I began to unravel a huge amount of differences in perspective and attitude that went way beyond just personality and one of us being a man and one being a woman. Although i don’t doubt that plays a bit part.
But given the current social climate we find ourselves in, with very divided attitudes and beliefs, I can’t help but wonder what thought processes those people are going though. On both sides. Not just because of visualing or lack thereof, but of all the other things that affect how you make decisions and access your position in society. There is much to mull over currently, and maybe I will find my way to writing my next non fiction book.
(c) K Wicks
Fear
This is another chapter from my book – Meeting in the Middle of Nowhere, this one regarding a subject that has consumed much of my thought over the years. Once the difference between Hyperphantasia and Aphantasia was established, it led me to requestion this particular theme and review it from a completely different angle. (If you are not familiar with my book or these terms – I have Hyperphantasia = over visualising in mind and my husband has Aphantasia = lack of visual imagery) And in these strange times where many people are being openly manipulated through fear, it would be wise to understand what it is and how it can affect you.
Fear ~
When we found out about the difference in ability for visual imagery, one of the subjects I raised was fear. I wanted to know if he was affected by horror movies. Although he doesn’t really care for them, I know he had a phase of watching them when younger, and I thought, if he doesn’t get anything from them, why would he watch them? That is one of the areas that I always felt uses your own visual imagery against you, horror films. Creating tension with unseen horrors or just nothing sometimes, only a piece of music – letting your brain make up something more terrible than they could.
And I was correct. It was a flat no. He didn’t get scared watching them or any time after, because his brain literally imagined nothing during the scenes where you did not see the monster or alien. Long scenes of nothing but tension will often lose his attention, and rightly so I realise. Therefore, he never thought there might be monsters under the bed, has never been afraid of the dark or something he can’t see.
“Why would I be afraid of an idea?”
A very logical question, I felt, because without visual imagery, there was nothing to be scared of. He doesn’t visualise what might happen, he doesn’t put himself in the place of others, and therefore no emotion at all is attached. They are just pictures on a screen and when they are finished, they are gone. No recall or replay happens after the event. We can discuss concepts and ideas, but I no longer make any reference to anything visual or implied visual, there is no point and it holds up a conversation.
I watch less horror myself these days. Once I realised my brain was imprinting most of what I saw and could recall it at any given moment, I decided I need to be a better filter. My moods and emotions are greatly affected by what I read, write, watch and see, so I choose what takes my attention wisely now. I have spent a big portion of my life being affected by my fears and phobias, something he simply cannot relate to. I have a number of them and have learnt to manage them over the years. Some may be familiar.
Example: When I was about 8 or 9, I watched Jaws. As you can possibly imagine, it didn’t do me any good. It affected me so much I didn’t go swimming or have a bath for a year. Only showers. Because my brain decided to visualise and imagine jaws coming up through the plughole. Or in the swimming pool, the filter became my point of fixation. I had nightmares about the sea, about swimming, about sharks. It haunted me greatly.
After a year or so, I started to go back in the water. But with a very changed mind-set. Every water experience was a chore, an anxiety-ridden feeling I tried desperately to hide. I was a tomboy and wanted to be cool. So swallowed my fear and did it, along the way reading as many factual books about sharks as I could. Trying to dispel my unnatural fear of something that did not inhabit the same terrain as me.
Around the age of 12 there were a couple of experiences that reminded me I was not over it, just working through it. In the Army Cadets we were on annual camp and part of our training was being made to jump in a lake, swim out to a small boat and back to shore. Sounds simple enough. Let me set the scene as it really was – it was a grey February day, a freezing cold lake in the woods, and the water was black as night, zero visibility. I was the only girl taking part because the other three had managed to come up with excuses. My fear was so paralysing I couldn’t think about anything other than what they were about to make me do. All I knew was that I couldn’t bottle it in front of everyone.
As the only girl they tried to make me go first, but that is where I put my foot down, no, I would go second. I may have also watched the film Alligator by then too, which only added to my already massive issues. Watching someone else jump in first and struggle to the boat did make me feel a bit better. I was a competent swimmer so my concern wasn’t skill based. I jumped in, and as my head went under just for a second my panic hit a new level. The only reason I think I managed it was the adrenaline from the fear. That same mechanism got me bronze medal at the cadet championships too, for swimming. Visualising a shark actually helped me there!
I am still not over it, I just don’t go near the water anymore. I love swimming as a sport and exercise but it’s not relaxing or enjoyable for me. Or even being on water; over a decade ago I visited The Gambia on holiday and had to go in a dugout canoe, the rim was only a centimetre above the water line. I was so tense I gripped the edge of the canoe the whole time, with fingertips only ever so slightly hanging over the edge, crocodiles and piranhas being my fear there. Again, I was just trying to save face but hated the experience and that I put myself through the anxiety of it.
So I now avoid water still because of a scary film I watched. It sounds pathetic, but the struggle is real. To my husband, it sounds mad and he can’t believe these things have affected me so much, but he kind of gets it a bit more now. He just doesn’t get why I continued to keep watching films that would give me nightmares and real fears. Zombie films also have their place in my Hall of Horror Phobias, but I now feel I am trying to put it to good use by writing books. I am torn though; when you work out what scared you so much, do you really want others to go through what you did? It’s the author’s dilemma for me; just because I can, does it mean I should?
I have also observed that fear and anxiety can be and are used in conjunction with each other for manipulative purposes.
Example: After my breakdown my mother was my sole company for most of the day. At first she seemed to be trying to help me get better, then after a year or two, the rhetoric changed. Instead of preparing me to reintegrate into society and become a real person again, I began to hear things like,
“You’ll never cope without me.”
I think it was from that point on all I could focus on was getting old enough to leave home. I didn’t care that I might not cope and the world was scary, I desperately wanted to have the chance. She, however, seemed to be filled with regret and constantly talked of plans involving me and her in the future. I was afraid I would never get away which added massively to my anxiety. Obviously the events that followed did ultimately see me get my wish to leave, but at the cost of everything. It took me quite a number of years to work through all of that and put it all where it needed to be. I can’t say I had it harder than anybody else, but it was definitely weird.
Photo and words taken from the film V for Vendetta.
Seeing things differently
It’s no secret that people see things differently to each other, think differently and react differently. It’s pointed out to us often, within men and women hugely – a classic book I never got round to reading springs to mind – Men Are from Mars and Women Are from Venus. I have heard this book mentioned and referred to by title on many ocassions (never an actual quote). But almost possibly to deflect from the fact those differences can cause issues and it’s easier to breeze over them and wave them away as ‘they just are’ rather than address them. It can be hard to get along with, communicate effectively with and have a balanced relationship with someone if you are unaware of why or how you are different. Just acknowledging it exists isn’t really enough in my opinion if it’s a fundamental one. We give people many excuses for their behaviour often without delving into the reason for it. Or think that by giving it reasoning can go someway to excusing it. Not in my mind. I like to know the why, it usually helps me to determine any possible conslusion, judgment or result that may need to occur.
There are many reasons why people don’t get along, and with some people you never will. But I find it interesting to understand why, even if the fault lies with me, it’s still good to know that. There are lots of important lessons around this I think, helping to form how we see the world, how we think the world see us, if people have that concept. But understanding why you are different can actually help you to fit in. Not in the tradiontional sense of adapting to others ways and fitting into their pattern – but finding your own fit. To a point, we all have to get along; living side by side and weaving our way through life together (unless you have removed yourself from having to). But finding out who are can be a tough one and coming up against others opinions, ideals or wills can be a challenge when they clash with your own. In this modern time of instant and sometimes public ommunication, being aware of the impact of influences is important.
But it should also be factored in that ideals, thoughts and perpsectives can change with time and experience. Your own and other peoples. It would be odd to expect to be the same person at 40 that you were at 20, impossible in my view. So it shouldn’t be a suprise that you may ‘outgrow’ people as they say, or ‘drift apart’ or simply just change. All of those can be correct, and are ok. But if poth parties aren’t aware or mature enough to really understand that, then there can be difficluties and I guess, arguments and fall outs. It’s not easy when you may have outgrown someone, but they haven’t you.
On top of personality and general interest differences, there are the fundamental ones that can affect things. For that I will reference one that can go completely undetected, for decades and even life, but is a really important one in my recent experience. The ability to visualise in mind. Some people can’t. Most people can apparently, and there is a percentage who over visualise. Although they don’t actually know, they have presumed that only 2% can’t visualise – calling this Aphantasia, the small percentage, maybe 10% they say over visualise – called Hyperphantasia. And everyone else they say is on a varying scale of being able to visualise between not at all and all the time. That is what they used as the base ‘normal’ level.
I didn’t know this was a thing, until well into my 30’s. All my life I have visualised, over visualised and remembered much, places, dates, times, people, events, amounts, information. Usually relevant to my life, some of it outside events and extremely useless trivia that seems to hang around of it’s own accord. I naively presumed that everyone did this. So, the applecart in my mind was well and truly tipped over, when through various discussions and disagreements between myself and my husband, I discovered through continued questioning and reasoning what I consider to be a fundamental difference, and one that was actually the root of many of the issues. He did not visualise. At all. It sounds small doesn’t it? He doesn’t ‘see’ pictures in his head, and I do, what’s the big deal? I wish it weren’t one, and that it was just as easy as he is left handed and I am right handed. But the nature of what unfolded from that was more complex – there were different areas it affected firstly between us, and then indivdually. We also both had to content with understanding we really aren’t like each other or everyone else. And being honest, it can throw you sideways a bit when you just thought you were average and like everyone else. Then also realising that no-one else is really who you thought they were either. It can bring a whole lot of questions, and did. Opening a few more strange doors into self knowledge that I couldn’t help but venture into.
I then tried to work through it all and address which areas I felt it affected and why, trying to help my husband adjust to this new knowledge and explain to him as best I could, what is going on in peoples minds. While at the same time trying to integrate this new aspect of thought into my own assessments, of myself and others. It was a game changer for me and has given me an entirely different perspective on my past, present and future, and how I view and try to understand other people.
If you would be interested to read more about this experience, my book Meeting in the Middle of Nowhere is available on Amazon.
(c) K Wicks
PTSD
This is a chapter excerpt from my recent published work – Meeting in the Middle of Nowhere.
PTSD
I wasn’t sure where this fit so it has its own small chapter. I also wanted to include it because before we knew of Aphantasia, my husband was actually rather dismissive of this condition. He said he didn’t understand why people were so traumatised to have this in the first place and why it goes on for so long. He can be extremely perceptive, so not getting it confused me and maybe because I had been diagnosed with this very thing, made me start to piece things together. Trauma and PTSD are different for everyone, but I believe memory and mental time travel made this last longer than necessary for me.
I had a breakdown and suffered from PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder – just in case you haven’t come across this term before) from the age of fourteen, then spent the next three to four years at home with just my mother. Very limited home schooling and little or no socialising outside of the house. Then just before I turned eighteen, my mother suffered a massive brain aneurysm. I’m not going to lie, it was the most shocking event of my life. Whatever trauma I thought I had experienced up until that point, was completely overshadowed. It was on my watch too, I was home late from an appointment mid-morning and found her, having to call the ambulance and deal with the initial fallout. We had dogs so I called my step-father and the ambulance left with her, leaving me alone in the house with the dogs for company.
But what I do find interesting is despite the awfulness of what was happening, a part of my brain kept functioning but in a very detached state. Reason and logic were working on a different level. It happened on a Monday, and although my older brother lived away, I knew it was his day off. So I didn’t call him. My reasoning being, I’m about to change his life forever, nothing will be the same after this. And although I desperately wanted company and to share this tragedy, I wanted him to have one more normal day. And he did, I told him the next day. So there is a part of me that does and can keep functioning when the other part of me has shut down. All I can call them are split experiences, I have access to both and took part in both, but which one I focus on can determine how I cope with them.
It has taken me years to get over that event. To make matters more complicated she survived, but not in a good state. She ended up stuck way up north where we were residing at the time, so very cut off from anyone. I was the only child left living at home and made the choice to not look after her. I left and chose me and my upcoming life instead. You may judge me as harsh for leaving, but if you knew the full background you would possibly understand. I was followed by years of guilt for leaving, having to find out what had happened in my life so I didn’t have to have it following me anymore.
It was five years later she passed away and although I was relieved, I was not left with a sense of peace for some time after. My guilt at not being there to save her, and for not looking after her kept followed me. Every minute of that experience is etched in my mind, and for years it replayed whenever it felt like it. But the whole five years it went on for too, and after the funeral. It’s for things like this that I do not appreciate having such clear memories with full imagery. The only thing I could do over the years was to dissociate the emotions that I had attached to them, gradually minimising the impact and effect it would have on me. My life is still up and down as I am, I’m just dealing with it slightly better these days.
After knowing people like me see images and memories in our heads, my husband did understand why PTSD was such a thing for so many people. Even giving me a bit of insight into how people without imagery may still be affected. He says that maybe by not being able to adequately remember or visualise a traumatic event end up leading to a lack of closure. You aren’t able to work through it and put it behind you. I know it’s different for everyone though so it’s always going to be hard to say for sure.
(c) K Wicks
Meeting in the Middle of Nowhere
MKW Publishing 