Memory Loss: Family Stories and History

~ Memory Loss ~
Tips to Remember

Memories. Aging. Memory Loss. Life Stories. Family History. Family Stories. Tips to help you remember Memory loss often means losing priceless stories and information important to a one’s history. Fortunately, many of our ‘lost’ memories can be retrieved with a little help.

One way to awaken dormant memories is by stimulating our senses with reminders from our past. With one memory is recalled, it often becomes easier for others to resurface as well.

Listed below are a few tips you can use to help stimulate your senses with reminders from your youth. Before you know it, you’ll be sharing stories and memories your family will treasure for years to come.

Memory Loss: Tips to Help You Remember

Vision & Memory Loss
Images are one way to trigger memories from our past. Start by reviewing old family photos and home movies. Try turning off the sound when watching the movies to allow yourself to see more. You can also find images of places and objects from your past by doing an online Google ‘Image’ search.
Hearing & Memory Loss
Certain sounds, music and voices also help to trigger memories. This time with your home movies, close your eyes and listen to just the audio. Do the same if you’re lucky enough to have old audio tapes of yourself or your family. To listen to music, commercials, newscasts and radio shows from your past, visit ‘Old World Radio’.
Touch & Memory Loss
If you don’t have items from your early years lying around, try visiting an antique store, nostalgia shop or doing an online search.
Smell & Memory Loss
Did your mother wear a certain perfume or did your grandfather smoke a pipe? Does the smell of gingerbread remind you of your grandmother during the holidays? Think about the smells you encountered in your youth and find a way to recreate or revisit them.
Taste & Memory Loss
Many people recall the joy around buying and eating their favorite candy as a child. You can recreate some of those experiences by visiting ‘Old Time Candy’ where you can buy candy from every decade. Or, for something a bit more savory, track down the recipe from your favorite dish mom or grandma used to make.

With your stories now remembered, capture them for your family. Just as you wished your Grandparents had recorded their stories, your Grandchildren, Great Grandchildren and beyond will cherish knowing yours.

Jot them down in a journal, record them on audio tape or, for something truly special, capture them in a Personal Documentary or Video Biography. This captivating moving portrait weaves together a filmed interview with family photos, documents, maps and other memorabilia to bring your stories to life. (See Samples)

Whichever format you choose, your children, grandchildren and great grandchildren will treasure the gift of knowing your story and their family history.

To learn more about capturing your memories, history and legacy in a video biography, take a look around my site or contact me directly.