Did he remember the whole episode, or parts of it?
They say memories form when kids start speaking in words, but who knows? My first memory dates back to approximately 10 months of age and is real. Lots of early memories are discrete, but I remember things that happened when I was three, with surprisingly many details.
JMO, and it can be different for each kid: children can remember voices, dialects, intonations, what was said, places, items. In general, our auditory memory doesn’t change much. Visually kids view the world from a different perspective. Adults are much taller, so kids’ descriptions of them may not match the reality. JMO, it seems that good memories are retained better than bad ones. Sometimes when kids cry there is almost like an amnestic episode. I didn’t have many traumatic events in my childhood, but take being “scratched by a cat” (between two to three): everything, including the scratch and what followed (allegedly, me yelling and parents tending to the scratch) is one massive timelapse but what led to the cat’s attack I remember perfectly, even his paw. The next memory is the pattern of the bandage. (I asked AI: “ Yes, intense crying, especially during highly emotional or stressful events, can cause memory lapses or interfere with memory encoding in children, acting like an "amnesic agent," making it harder for them to recall those experiences later, though the brain is still developing and forming crucial templates for emotional regulation.”) I never had breath-holding spells or syncope, I think it is own crying and stress that wiped off “the immediate aftermath”.
So this is what I hope for: that if the kids were traumatized and cried, that this part they’ll forget. (Maybe they saw nothing, we don’t even know).
Kohei, the son of Namiko Takaba (we have a thread about her) remembered interesting details as a baby but totally forgot everything as an adult, including his mom. Although his dad did everything to keep the memory of his wife. Maybe the older child will retain certain perception of mom: some big warm shadow hugging him. Or her silhouette against the window. Or the smell. Or the color of her dress.
My personal feeling about it.
