If you have experienced a life-threatening event, you may have what is called PTSD or Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. One symptom of PTSD is the inability to remember 'chunks of stuff' before, during and after the event. This is quiet common. There can be quite a long period of blankness in ones memory and it may be several short instances. Nonetheless, these periods of loss of memory are termed "Fragmented" memory.

From my research, one of the most commonly frustrating qualities that the partners of children of Vietnam Veterans mention is their partner's inability to plan for the future. Interestingly, this quality is very similar to their Vietnam Veteran parent.

The reseach on memory suggests that if you have no memory of the past, you will experience difficulties in deriving a plan for the future because our expectancies for behaviour/action are based on our experiences: they are our cornerstone for predicting the possible. Like having a library of reference experiences, we predict based on what we have previously experienced. However, if that library has been burnt down, our references are lost. All our personal models for social interaction are based on what we 'know' - what we have learned from our experiences. For example, some of us may consider ourselves a good judge of character. My question is how did you become that? Trial and error? Experience...lots of it? Can you predict how a person will react simply by looking at them? How did you learn to do that?

How good a judge of character would you be if you lost your memory? How would you predict a person's intentions or behaviour?

Experience is what forges our personality and character. It is what, and who we are. We are today a product of all our experiences. Its what gives us our social and personal identity. It identifies us. If we have lost the memory of those experiences then we have likewise lost our identity. PTSD is a condition that involves memory loss and therefore a large part of identity loss.

Research is suggesting that PTSD symptoms may be heritable. This includes fragmented memory impairments. If the children of Vietnam Veterans are experiencing loss of memory, then research suggests they may also be experiencing difficulties in planning for their future.

There are other factors that may apply also. Currently my research is examining the loss of identity for children of Vietnam Veterans. The study also strongly suggests that the grandchildren of these Veterans are already experiencing difficulties in establishing theirs.

Other reasons may be because they can barely cope with the daily challenges of being who they are. Coping is not a move forward. Coping is going to bed each night with nothing positive gained: You have performed your basic functions on minimal energy, and can only see tomorrow as doing it all again. Management, however, involves positive growth. It means going to bed each night with a sense of achievement: You have gained something today and can wake up with extra vigor tomorrow. People who cope on a daily basis have little opportunity to plan. People who lean how to manage, can. Again, this involves memory. If you can turn your experiences into management strategies, you will gain. If you have no such memories you cannot.