A few years ago, I had a dream that changed my life.
In the dream, I was inside my mother’s womb. I felt the warmth of the water, soft colors floating around me, and sounds that touched my whole body. But suddenly, the scene shifted: a weight, a pain, a violence. The feeling was so strong that, when I told my psychologist, I could only say:
“It was as if I were being violated through her.”
Until then, I didn’t know it was possible to have such early memories. But my psychologist explained that there is something called fetal memory – the ability to store experiences even before birth.
When Music Becomes Memory
Not all of my memories from that time are painful. My father used to place classical music records against my mother’s belly so I could “listen.” To this day, when I hear certain melodies, I feel a deep calm, as if I were back in that safe inner space.
Science confirms this: studies show that, in the last trimester of pregnancy, babies can already recognize voices, sounds, and even melodies. These experiences can be recorded and influence tastes and emotions throughout life.
When Silence Is Pain
But the womb was not only a place of affection. Decades later, in a conversation with my mother, I learned that she had suffered sexual abuse (by an uncle) since adolescence – and that it continued during her pregnancy. She tried to protect me, but could not prevent the violence – the same uncle who would later do the same to me in childhood.
That was when I understood the dream: maybe it wasn’t just imagination, but a very early memory, shaped by fear and tension.
Science also points in this direction. Research shows that a mother’s intense stress crosses the placenta and directly affects the baby. Cortisol, the stress hormone, can alter brain areas linked to emotions and fear, leaving lifelong marks.
What Remains?
If a baby can learn a melody before being born, what happens when the first “sound” is the heavy silence of unspoken pain?
Perhaps that silence also becomes memory. Perhaps it turns into an inner rhythm that follows us forever.
Between my father’s music and my mother’s fear, I inherited two soundtracks: one of affection, the other of violence. My life has been, in part, the effort to rewrite that score.
Download or Read more here:
BATISTA, D. J. (2025). Fetal Memory, Prenatal Trauma, and Intergenerational Sexual Violence: A First-Person Narrative. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.16811063