Megan Schmidt

I have aphantasia but have vivid dreams. I love dreaming and the time just between sleep and wake where I can recall the images.

Also, I just questioned my two teen boys. Turns out, they both have aphantasia. They were imaging the Apple and describing the Apple, zooming in on the stem…but then revealed they actually see black.

I probably wouldn’t tell my teens that I have no visual memories of my childhood (implying I don’t of their childhood either). I would say I have great memories. (I can’t can’t physically see it)

Black with whatever my physical rods and cones ar doing. Like reading this text, I close my eyes and get lines of back and white like a negative. Areas of white, yellow, red all depend on what my eyes were physically handling. If I stay closed, It will fade to black. If extreme darkness, I can even make out individual red/green rods or cones, they look like like Marvin the martians.

Your numbers feel pretty aligned with how I’d score myself. Fully offline (0–2/10): Visual imagery, sound, smell, taste, touch, episodic memory Partial (3–5/10): Circadian/body clock Online (6–10/10): Inner voice, spatial navigation, kinesthetic movement, semantic/logical thinking, time/planning, interoception (body awareness), emotional processing I do not have an issue imaging how other people feel though. I am strongly empathic and feel how they feel in the moment. I can also imagine how something would feel. But nothing on hearing imagines sounds, seeing imagined images etc.

I have complete aphantasia but have no problem recognizing faces. I an imagine them in a certain way and describe them with words. I could even draw them. I just can’t picture them visually.