It’s been the opposite for women’s clothing in my experience. I’ve had to give up multiple brands as their shirts got too big. Same labeled size, same style, but it’s suddenly 2” wider.

Agree on all points! When I was had my first grownup job I was trying to build up my wardrobe and found a pair of jeans that fit and felt great. Size 3. I went back after another paycheck to get an identical third pair and when I got home, they were practically falling off of me. I had to exchange them for a 1, which was still larger than the size 3s from just a month or two earlier.

But a fitted bra? One of my best purchases ever. Getting in the right size resolved about 70% of my chronic back pain. Fit is different between bra types but decent brands’ sizes are standardized, regardless what OP says.

What age do you start remembering what you were like?

I became really self-aware at 11. I’m guessing a bit about being 10, but 6th grade (11-12) is when I feel like I started being the person I still am 20+ years later. Obviously I’ve grown, but it started then.

Probably that I’m alive?

I already dealt with (undiagnosed) chronic depression by 10. The first time I thought about killing myself I don’t think I even knew the word “suicide.” I also had an overwhelming sense that I wouldn’t live past 30. That might not have started until I was 11 or 12, but I think it was there when I was younger.

Weirdly my mom also had an overwhelming sense that she would lose me at a young age from the day I was born, which she didn’t have with my older sister.

Well, I’m past 30 now. My love of people in my life has kept the suicidal ideation to only that. While I still have chronic depression, I’ve learned to manage it better over the years and medication helps.

I genuinely don’t know why I was depressed or had suicidal thoughts that young. I didn’t have a traumatic home or childhood. My parents worked a lot but loved me and my sister without question. We didn’t have a lot of money but always had enough food. I loved school and had great teachers. I wasn’t sexually assaulted before I was 10 (I think I was 12 the first time). I don’t know and that bothers me.

ETA: I guess I was bullied at school by 10, so maybe that accounts for it?

A dear friend of mine went there as well. He was the first trans person I knew, almost 20 years ago now, and I know he loved New College and the support he got through his transition there.

As hard as it is to see this for me, I expect it’s heartbreaking for him, and that makes me sad.

I put down my best friend of 20 years on October 5th and fuck it’s hard. I’m sorry. You know you’re making the caring decision and loving your dog until the end though, and that is a gift.

It’s going to be hard. I’m starting to feel like myself again between the moments of deep grief, but I am still fragile and sad and will be for a long time.

If you ever need comfort from a stranger, feel free to save my name or comment and shoot me a message.

I was fortunate that individuals in my elementary school actually made accommodations for me being ahead of average. My third grade teacher gave me a fourth grade math book and special assignments from it. The pull-out classes for smart kids were K-2 and 3-5, but I got put in the 3-5 class in second grade. My principal supported my parents in moving me to a different class because of teachers who weren’t supporting me (multiple times, actually).

My school was in a pretty low-income district, but I completely lucked out with educators (and parents) who fought for me.

Definitely still ended up on the gifted child > burnt out teen/adult who struggles with some basic life skills, but at least I didn’t end up struggling with my ADHD in school until high school because of the support in my younger years.

This 1955 featurette interpreted it as re-gifting daily. It ends up being a LOT of birds.

Many people mentioned clearing ALL the snow off your car, but I didn’t see people mentioning why. Here are some videos to elaborate how terrifying and dangerous it can be when people don’t do that.

One, two, three, four

It takes a lot of energy to clear the car off, but it’s critical. Don’t be the person that harms someone else just to save a bit of time and effort.

A DMV is accountable for driving laws and practices in their own state, not educating people about every possible driving condition anywhere.

Wait, are you saying that Virginia not mentioning what to do if a moose is in the road is “bad”?

Considering that the northern-most part of Virginia is still about 350 mi south of the closest range of moose, it would be pointless if not absurd for them to include it.

I’ve definitely talked about ND behaviors within minutes of meeting strangers at parties (either they bring it up or I do about myself, never calling someone else out for it).

I’m a nerd, therefore most of my friends are nerds, and so too are their friends. While I don’t have data to back this up, I believe most nerds are ND (I literally can’t think of any NT folks in my social circle). We tend to be good at pattern recognition, so identifying similar traits when there’s already the confirmation of being friends-of-friends tends to be enough to get into such topics, lol.

With one parent who turned 80 this year and the second in their late 70s, I’ve realized there’s a difference between “elderly” and “old.” A lot of people equate the two. I think “old” always started in one’s 70s to me, even as a kid. “Elderly,” however, is not based on a number but on a physical state of being.

My dad is elderly. He’s frail and struggling to move around much. It’s hard to watch and it’s been going on and worsening for a few years now. My mom, despite being only 3 years younger, is not at all elderly. She has more energy and vivacity than many people over 20 years her junior (hell I’m in my 30s and she can do loops around me, but I got the chronic illness genes that she didn’t have). Technically, she’s old. But no one who knows her would think of her as “elderly.”

If I think of tasting a lime, my mouth puckers and salivates like I’m about to eat something sour. I could probably say I’m imagining the taste, similar to how you described, like a 1/10.

I think hearing is maybe like that but like 1/100 instead of 1/10? It’s hardest to explain that one because with the stuck song thing, it’s there. I know it’s there. I can’t not imagine the song when it’s stuck. But I don’t “hear” it in any way like my ears hear things?

Smell I can’t imagine at all, but I can usually recognize smells (“usually” because for things that are similar to a memory, like someone wearing the aftershave my dad used as a kid or something that smells like my grandmother’s house from 25 years ago, are likely a miss, but normal things I recognize without question).

Visuals are probably more like smell in that I just don’t have them, but remembering visuals is more critical so I’m better at coping with that one.

I will mention I’ve met people and then instantly forgotten everything about how they looked, like I could only tell you gender and race, but I recognized them when I saw them again. Now, I had context clues. Like I met a couple in a dive shop in town then saw them at the airport on the way to the trip we were both going on through the dive shop. I knew I’d probably see them at the airport and I knew them when I did. But I couldn’t have told you a thing about them until then! It was the weirdest experience, and I think not being able to visualize was the root cause.

I remember their name as a fact associated with the person.

That’s how the way something looks is stored in my head.

Derp, I was exhausted last night and said the wrong shape. But yeah, I just recognize things without needing to visualize it when it isn’t around.

I’ve definitely heard other aphants talk about not enjoying books. I love reading, but I typically don’t care for authors who are overly descriptive about visual things OR I just zone out during those descriptions. Most authors I read stuck to 1-2 sentence descriptions of things and then move on to what’s actually happening. That’s fine, and I might keep 1-2 of those details in mind.

I recently drew what I imagined the layout for a building in my favorite book series to be, then went back and found the text describing it to compare. I was way closer than I expected to matching the description, except I didn’t remember the entryway was a “long hallway” because literally none of the story happens there. If the description matters to the plot, I’m more likely to retain it. If something is only described at the beginning and in a lot of detail, I probably will not retain any of it.

I cannot hear in my head either, but my partner is an aphant who can do that, so they are unconnected. That one is weird too because I have songs stuck in my head all the time and I ‘know’ what they sound like, and my brain keeps the beat with the song, but I’m not hearing it. If anything it’s more like I’m silently singing along to the song. I do tend to get snippets of songs in my head because I can’t always remember where it goes though (I write as one line from a song circles endlessly through my mind).

Can you taste or smell things that aren’t around? If not, do you still know what those things are when you do taste or smell them?

It’s hard to explain how one thinks. But yeah, I think of the words to describe something and they are automatic. I can’t describe a lot of detail about anything unless I’m looking at it, but I know enough of the basics to remember things.

I think the name comparison I mentioned is probably the best I can think of. When you see a person you know, how do you remember their name? Unless you’re a person who imagines their name on their forehead in order to remember it in the first place, I assume it’s just a word you associate with that person? That’s what the details of everything are like for me.

A triangle is a shape with three sides; that’s all I need to know and I can draw it. A stop sign is a hexagon, red, with STOP in the middle.

I can’t draw anything more complex than that unless I’m looking at it. I’m pretty good at recreating images I look at, but I can’t do art from my own head for shit; it’s paralyzing to even consider doing it.

When I’m reading a book, I’ll retain the most often repeated and basic physical traits. Harry Potter had a lightning scar and glasses, Ron Weasley was red headed, and Hermione had crazy hair. If there were other descriptions in the books, they never sunk in; my brain just disregarded them. However, now I think of Daniel Radcliffe and the other actors. I can’t describe what they look like but I can recognize those people with no hesitation.

Not who you asked, but yes I could answer and also yes it’s gone from my mind’s eye. I would be answering from memory.

I have no mind’s eye. Full-stop. But I have memory and can recall details without needing to see the thing.

If you can remember someone’s name after meeting them, that’s the same process it would be for me to remember their hair or shirt color.

Psst…he was making reference to a meme (see other reply for screenshot).

Motion sensor and smart light switch. There are two rooms in my house with multiple entryways and awful light switch options, so without these I’d just stumble in the dark.

We also have it for our carport and it’s so pleasant for the light to automagically happen and then go off without needing to remember to change anything.

(And all of this done through local mesh and Apple HomeKit. We do not use proprietary services that can be shut down on us.)