Michelle Philpots – A Woman With A 24-Hours Memory

Michelle Philpots is a 53-year-old woman that suffers from a rare memory disorder that causes her memory to be refreshed every single day. Her short-term memory began with two separate road accidents that severely damaged her brain and now she wakes up every day thinking it’s 1994. Her first road accident was back in 1985, where she was on a motorbike and was diagnosed epilepsy. The second accident was in 1990 where she got into a car accident and suffered memory deterioration ever since. The specific title of Michelle’s disorder is anterograde amnesia.

Anterograde amnesia is the brain’s loss of ability to store new memories, making the patient unable to recall recent past memories. However, long-term past memories are well-stored in the brain and are fully functional. Anterograde amnesia usually occurs due to the damages done to at least three distinct brain areas: the hippocampus, basal forebrain, and the diencephalon. The hippocampus serves as the door for which new fact information passes and are permanently remembered by the brain. So, if the hippocampus is damaged – severely damaged in Michelle’s case – no new factual information can become permanent memories, resulting in short-term memory. Damage to the hippocampus is apparent after epilepsy, which Michelle was already diagnosed after her first road accident in 1985. Another component of the brain responsible for memory-related activity that was damaged is the basal forebrain. The basal forebrain is the group of structures in the brain that produces acetylcholine, an organic chemical that functions as a neurotransmitter that helps brain cells remember newly learnt information.

Michelle’s basal forebrain was damaged by aneurysm, an excessive localized enlargement of an artery, of the anterior communicating artery – an essential blood vessel of the brain that supplies blood throughout the brain – in her severe car accident in 1990. The last part of the brain that was damaged is the diencephalon, which are set of structures deep within the brain. As of now, there isn’t a clear reason why damage to the diencephalon would result in memory damage. However, Korsakoff’s disease – a disease that arises from lack of thiamin which ultimately damages areas of the brain that are critical for memory – is a syndrome that might damage the diencephalon and cause anterograde amnesia. Also, dead and damaged brain cells were removed during a major operation at London’s QE2 Hospital in 2005 to prevent her from having seizures which also contributed plenty to her lost memory.

Currently, Michelle Philpots wakes up thinking it’s 1994 every morning. Ian Philpots, her husband has to show her their wedding pictures to prove that they are married because they got married in 1997, which was already several years into Michelle’s retrograde amnesia. Her brain’s function to store memory was dramatically deteriorating, and by 1993, she started to leave tea bags in the refrigerator, and eventually was fired from her job at a solicitor’s firm because she spent her whole day photocopying the exact same document. Post-it notes and reminders on her mobile phone became a must in her everyday life to keep her on track of appointments and everyday duties. Relating to that post-it notes, anything Michelle has done and anyone that she has met and had a conversation with must be all written down because she will forget the next morning when she wakes up, thinking it’s 1994. On special occasions where she must leave the house, she is always with a sat-nav with her address so she doesn’t get lost and or wander off track. Michelle never gets tired of watching her favorite TV show, BBC soap Eastenders, even though she doesn’t know a single character nor does she know any of the plot.

Currently, Michelle is still alive even though her days have always been the same since 1994. She resides in the town of Spalding, Lincolnshire in England and supposedly lives the same day with her husband; even though he must remind her that he is her husband every day. Michelle tries to live her every day to her fullest even though to her, it is the same every day and must always have post-it notes and must always be equipped with a sat-nav when leaving her home. She receives help from rehabilitation specialists to help improve her memory and train her memory. She has even passed a series of digital memory exams with flying colors with the help of a manual every time she makes use of a computer. Michelle also volunteers for a locally disabled charity three times a week, where she says that “When I wake up everything outside my window is the same. It’s hard to explain, but every day to me is the same normal day. It’s like I am living the same day – day after day”.