By Angela Lam
If I wrote for late night TV, I might have submitted this script for The Daily Show:
Jon Stewart flourishes his blue pen across the blue page. When the intro music stops, he says, “Forget politics! Let’s discuss family matters.” When the audience laughs, Jon points to the overhead video of Rose Hernandez Turpin sitting across from her mother, Angela Lam, during a get-together arranged by Angela’s husband, Kevin Gross, who thought, in his infinite parental wisdom, to gather two of their daughters who had recently separated from their partners for a meal of commiseration.
In the video, the dinner conversation steers away from relationships ending to job hunts to schooling.
Rose says, “See, that’s why I don’t go back to school. I earn more money on commission.”
“You couldn’t go to school anyway,” Angela says. “You failed trigonometry three times and failed to get into the science program.”
Rose gapes and her eyes widen. “That’s not true,” she says. “I passed the third time with a B, was accepted into all four colleges I applied to, including the microbiology department, but you said you could only afford to pay for one year, so I didn’t go.”
The room is silent.
The audience holds their collective breaths.
“I don’t remember any of that,” Angela says.
The camera zeroes in on Rose’s trembling lips. “You don’t remember sitting in Dad’s house and telling me we were going to lose our deposit on the housing because we waited too long to cancel?”
The camera pans to Angela’s solemn face. She shakes her head.
Rose gulps. “You don’t remember how I had to email everyone to say I was withdrawing?”
Again, Angela shakes her head.
“You don’t remember what you did with my college money?”
For the third time, Angela shakes her head.
“You fixed my nose,” Rose says, pointing to her freckles. “What do you remember?”
“I thought you couldn’t go to college because you never passed trig,” Angela says.
“Why would you misremember?” Rose asks.
Angela shrugs and glances at her husband. “I was drinking a lot in those days.”
Rose shakes her head. “So, you don’t remember anything that really happened? Do you need to see my transcript?”
“No, I believe you,” Angela says. “I just am surprised I don’t remember anything.”
The video ends, and Jon says, “Con-fab-u-la-tion! Folks, it’s a real phenomenon. People are so traumatized by an event that they create a false memory to replace the real one, which is too painful. Now, I know you didn’t get to see the whole video, but Angela explains she didn’t want to fail her daughter in the same way her father failed her by not being able to afford her college education, so she created that false memory of her daughter failing trigonometry three times so she could absolve herself from the same crime her father had committed. The crime of false promises to your children. The crime of perpetuating generational trauma. The crime of disappointing yourself and others for poor planning, or in Angela’s case, for just being poor.
“Now, what would I say to Angela whose daughter, Rose, has chosen to disown her because of this revelation?” Jon swivels to face another camera and softens his gaze. “Oh, Angela, it’s hard being a parent, especially in this day and age when everyone expects you to be perfect. Well, you’re not. No one is. Gone are the days of gratitude when children only asked for food on their plates and a roof over their heads. Nowadays you need to provide for their education so they can help themselves fly from the nest and never return. But don’t cry. Not all is lost. Your daughter, since she doesn’t have that education, and is currently unemployed, will most likely contact you again once she runs out of unemployment benefits, life savings, and couch surfing at her friends’ houses. Until then, buck up and stay strong, and see a therapist or a hypnotist to see if you can recover any of those blocked out memories.”
The segment ends, and a commercial for Ozempic begins.
***
If I wrote for the local paper, I might have submitted this article:
The front-page headline in The Press Democrat screams, “Daughter Disowns Mother.”
The article reads: Rose Hernandez Turpin was last seen on Wednesday night, January 28, 2026, at 8 pm. She had just finished dinner with her mother, Angela, and her stepfather, Kevin, and her stepsister, Courtney, when she discovered her mother had misremembered a crucial fact from her life. Her mother said Rose could not attend college because she had failed trigonometry three times. According to the documents gathered and verified by third-party sources, the truth was Rose had failed trigonometry twice, but passed the third time with a B, was accepted by all four colleges she had applied to, was admitted into the microbiology program at Arizona State University, but could not attend because her mother did not have the money to send her. This confabulation shocked all the dinner attendees, including Kevin who said to Angela, “I can’t trust you anymore. I’m writing you out of my will and transferring the duties of successor trustee to someone who can remember things.”
Angela said, “I’m stunned. I usually have a great memory. Until my concussion last year.”
Kevin told reporters, “Angela can’t blame the concussion for this error. She’s been telling me this story for years. Something else is going on.”
When asked, Angela said, “I guess that glitch in my memory is from trauma. I didn’t want to fail my daughter the same way my father failed me, so I blacked out the truth with my daughter failing trig three times.” Angela stated her father had gambled away her college fund, forcing her to work her way through school instead of attending an Ivy League university. She stated she was bitter and resentful, at first, but forgave him after having children of her own.
Angela’s father died in 2018, so he could not be reached for comment.
According to neurologists, no one’s memory is 100% accurate, but some people make many memory errors. They believe in the accuracy of these faulty memories and can be convincing when talking about them. This is called confabulation.
Confabulation is usually autobiographical, involving people misremembering their own experiences. Confabulators have no reason to lie and do not realize they are not telling the truth. Conditions linked to confabulation include alcohol use disorder, Alzheimer’s disease, and traumatic brain injury.
Angela suffered from both alcohol use disorder for 9 months in 1999 and 7 years from 2015 to 2022, and a traumatic brain injury at the end of 2024. According to those who know her, this incident is the first time she has confabulated.
Confabulation often frustrates, angers, or saddens family members, leading to estrangement. Family members need to remember confabulators need compassion, not judgment.
Currently, there is no effective treatment, and no statistics documenting how many people are afflicted, or how many families have experienced fallout.
When asked about the incident, Courtney said she was sorry it happened.
Despite several attempts, Rose could not be reached for comment.
***
If I wrote screenplays, I might have submitted this family drama for the big screen:
FADE IN:
INT. SUBURBAN HOME – AFTERNOON
A WOMAN sits on the sofa, palming her cell phone in her left hand. She is ANGELA (54), overweight, worried about her daughter, ROSE (25). ANGELA is dressed in an oversized long-sleeved T-shirt and jeans.
ANGELA’S POV
1:59 PM – ANGELA types a text message to ROSE HERNANDEZ TURPIN. WE SEE each letter as it fills the screen on her cell phone.
—How are you doing today?—
Since receiving an alarming text from Rose’s best friend, Claire, on Wednesday, December 17, 2025, at 2:24 pm, asking her to check on her daughter’s mental health, Angela has been in daily contact with Rose.
WE SEE the text status on Angela’s phone:
“Delivered,” not “Read.”
WE SEE the time a half hour later when ANGELA calls.
INTERCUT PHONE CONVERSATION
ROSE HERNANDEZ TURPIN (V.O.)
You have reached Rose.
Please leave a message.
Angela does not leave a message.
FADE OUT.
***
I am a memoirist. Instead of the script, the article, or the screenplay, I sat on the rocking chair in the family room staring at the blank screen.
When I had stared for a half hour, I sent an email to my friend, Nicole, “How can you write a memoir when you can’t trust what you remember?”
A few minutes later, Nicole responded. “Write into those fascinating contradictions. Write your memory. Then write your daughter’s. Make it about the act of (mis)remembering rather than ‘what happened.’ Then write about your feelings (embarrassment, shame, wondering…) and the fallout (distrust from others, of self). Write it all and see what happens rather than try to accurately capture the one true plot.”
A little while later, Nicole added a postscript. “And… consider the situation vs the story. Situation: You misremembered. Or, You thought your daughter A when it was B. Story: ‘My brain created that false memory to protect me from failing my daughter in the same way my father failed me when I was her age.’ I want to know that story! How did he fail you. How did you fail her? How does the brain protect oneself? What are the consequences now? Etc.”
I thanked her for the advice. On my laptop, I opened a new Microsoft Word Document and began typing a poem.
Prelude
Because I cannot trust my memory
(and the Mandela Effect is real),
I am writing a hybrid memoir/novel
Where the memories are suspect
And the imagination is real,
Both filling in the gaps
With facts and emotions,
The ingredients of raw truth.
Because I do not want to be sued
Or disowned or accused of lying,
I am labeling truth as fiction
And fiction as truth, even when
The memories feel more real
(because in the mind’s eye they are).
Confabulation? Or just the broken
Mechanics of how memories are formed
And stored in the human brain?
Not a video, no, just fragments, images,
Fleeting emotions, and snippets
Of conversations recalled and revised
From stress or trauma,
or mental illness or substance abuse.
The conscious and the unconscious battle
Over big events and tiny details
Until all the facts and memories
Swirl and blend and disappear into nothingness.
What emerges is this hybrid memoir/novel
Of several lifetimes of friendship and love,
Driven by a kept promise.
***
In addition to writing, I practice mixed media art on canvas. But my daughter is also an artist. She studied art in high school. For a long time, I wanted her to become a professional and live the life I wished my parents had encouraged me to enjoy. But, as you already know, she wanted to study science.
When people ask why I don’t post any new artwork on social media, I tell them I have not created anything new since my daughter disowned me.
It is true. I have not found a way to break through the blank canvas, to express what I need to say, if anything, beyond what I have already said with a handful of words.
Angela Lam is an author of several novels and two book-length memoirs, Red Eggs and Good Luck and The Fool and the Magician. She currently teaches creative writing at Gotham Writers Workshop. She is also a visual artist who sells her mixed media creations on canvas throughout the United States.
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