Remembering

The concept of what ‘mind blindness’ is may not be familiar to everyone. Photographic evidence can provide snapshots of the conversations that we ‘have’ with the world, in that it documents a microscopic increment of our interaction with time and with the environment. The point of view of the observer, the point of view of their finger on the button, what part of a memory do we choose to recall to pass on as information. Is it on topic or is it off topic? Or is that part of the difficulty in that the topic is quite large and difficult to convey to others which can result in challenging behaviours. Others may find it difficult to share ‘their’ perspectives on what happened when they were in the room. Being able to track physical events where there is only directional movement may be easier to remember. Being able to track conversations may be harder. Movement of objects around the room can make it easier to remember things.

The mental blackboard is full of very live lived experiences and some kids find it difficult to talk about their experiences of a whole event or sequences of events (both during and beyond in time). They may require other adults who were there are the time to talk for them and then they can jump into the conversation with pieces that were missed or pieces that are now more easy to talk about both physically (because of the length of respiratory control required to talk for such a long period) and emotionally because they can see that the tone of conversation is now physically and emotionally safe to be around. Documenting or thinking through conversations in preparation for these types of discussions is helpful.