Can Babies Remember Being In Utero and Their Own Births?
A Conversation with Psychiatrist and APPPAH Founder, Dr. Thomas Verny
Pregnancy is often described as a time of physical growth and preparation for birth — but what if it is also the beginning of memory, relationship, and emotional experience for babies themselves?
In part one of this conversation, psychiatrist, researcher, author, and APPPAH founder, Dr. Thomas Verny joins The Prepared for Parenthood Podcast to explore a question that has shaped decades of his work: can babies remember their time in the womb and their births? Together, we discuss prenatal memory, fetal awareness, how babies may be affected by stress and connection during pregnancy, and what this means for expectant and new parents.
Dr. Stephanie Dueger
Welcome to Prepared for Parenthood. I’m thrilled today to have our guest, Dr. Thomas Verny, who is a psychiatrist, academic, award-winning author, poet, global speaker, blogger on Psychology Today, and columnist for The Globe and Mail. He’s the author of eight books, including the international bestseller, The Secret Life of the Unborn Child, which has been published in 27 countries. And he’s the author of The Embodied Mind: Understanding the Mysteries of Cellular Memory, Consciousness, and Our Bodies. That book has been published in Spanish, Greek, Russian, Portuguese, and Czech. He’s also the author of 47 scientific papers.
Dr. Verny has previously taught at Harvard University, University of Toronto, York University, Toronto, St. Mary’s University, Minneapolis, and the Santa Barbara Graduate Institute. In 2004, Mothering Magazine, in recognition of his contributions in the field of parenting and child rearing, named Dr. Verny one of their living treasures. In 2005, Santa Barbara Graduate Institute bestowed on him the Doctorate of Humane Letters. Dr. Verny founded the Association for Prenatal and Perinatal Psychology and Health, and I had the great pleasure of working with him for six years on APPPAH’s scientific journal, JOPPPAH. So welcome, I’m so happy you’re here.
Thomas R. Verny, MD
Thank you. I’m happy to be here too.
Can Babies Really Remember Their Time in the Womb?
Dr. Stephanie Dueger
There are so many different questions that I could ask you. And I really want to focus today on how you came to understand that babies in utero and at birth are actually having remembered lived experiences and are not just blank slates as we used to think in psychology. How did you stumble into this arena and start working with this?
Why the “Blank Slate” Theory of Babies Is Being Reconsidered
Thomas R. Verny, MD
Yes, stumble is a good word. What sort of started me off on this track was an experience with a patient. I’m a psychiatrist, and I worked with my patients. Usually, I focused a lot on their dreams. One day I was working with a young man, and while we were working on his dream, he suddenly started crying like a little baby. And he did that for 10 minutes approximately, then he came out of it. And so, I asked him what happened. And he said he had just found himself in a crib. He said, “I was crying in this crib. I was crying for my mother.” And then he said, being a somewhat skeptical young lawyer, “You know, there’s something wrong with this picture, because I’ve actually seen photographs of myself as a baby, and they were all taken in a blue crib. And the crib that I just found myself in right now was white. So, it doesn’t quite make sense.” So, I suggested that he speak to his mother. He was a young man. He still had his parents alive.
The next week he came back, and I asked him what happened. He said, “This is amazing. What happened was that when I was born, my parents were very poor. They could not afford to buy me a crib. And so, they borrowed a crib from a neighbor and that crib was white. And only three months later did they have somehow enough money. They bought me my very own crib and that was blue. And that’s the one that all the photographs were taken in.”
So, I sort of scratched my head about that. That was the very first time I’d heard anything like that in my life. And I was pretty well educated, as you have implied, some of the best schools in North America. And I was always taught that children before the age of two can’t remember anything. So, I sort of put it on the back shelf of my mind.
How Dr. Thomas Verny Began Studying Prenatal Memory
Thomas R. Verny, MD
And then a couple of months later, I heard this interview on the radio with one of the best-known conductors in Canada. And towards the end of the interview, I guess the interviewer kind of ran out of things to ask. And so, she said, “Tell me, Boris, how did you get into conducting?” And he said, “It started in my mother’s womb.”
Well, everybody sat up; nobody had heard that before. And they said, “What do you mean?” And he said, “Well, when I first started conducting, some of the lines of the cello kind of jumped out at me. Before I even changed the page, I knew what was coming, although I had never studied that particular score. So, then I went home to my mother once again, the well of all good news, and asked her about that. And she said, ‘Well, what is the score that seems so familiar to you?’ And he told her what it was. And she was a cello player. And she said, ‘Those were the very melodies that I used to practice when I was pregnant with you.’”
So, you know, I started thinking about that. And then I had more and more similar experiences, because I guess my ear was tuned into that kind of thing. For example, a friend of mine sang a certain song to her unborn child. But she said, “After the child was born and he started crying, I tried to sing all kinds of other songs to him, but the only song that really settled him was the one that I used to sing when I was pregnant.”
So, then that was sort of enough to make me think. I started doing research and I found a few sort of research articles in scientific journals that seemed to support the possibility that an unborn child may be laying down memories. And so again, serendipity. I had dinner with a very well-known obstetrician in Canada at that time. I was a totally unknown young psychiatrist. And I told him about these experiences that I had been accumulating. And he said, “Well, in two months, there’s this huge congress. It meets every four years on psychosomatic obstetrics and gynecology in Rome. Why don’t you submit a paper?”
Well, by that time, I mean I was a young, beginning psychiatrist, but I knew enough to know that when you are a presenter, you get treated much better than if you’re just an ordinary member of the audience. So why not? So, I submitted this paper, and I called it The Psychic Life of the Unborn Child. And lo and behold, it was accepted. And not only was it accepted, but it was put on the best morning schedule, where people like R.D. Laing were going to speak. And the best-known people at that time in psychosomatic obstetrics and gynecology were slated to speak. And I had 20 minutes with all those leading lights.
And so, when I spoke and related some of my experiences, like the two of them which I’ve just told you, and more, I could sense kind of electricity running through the audience. And I could feel their energy coming. This is, I guess, what actors talk about — why they like acting on stage instead of performing in movies, because you get that back and forth. And so, I said at the end of my 20 minutes, “If anybody here would like to continue a conversation about this, please come to my room at five o’clock.” Well, at five o’clock, there was this lineup of people trying to get into my room. Ronnie Laing was there and all the other ones that I have forgotten the names of right now. And we talked, and I made contact with these people, and they were all very supportive and enthusiastic.
And so, when I came back to Canada, I started writing about how this is possible in terms of biology. How is this possible? Because we were taught that, for example, the large nerve tracts are not yet myelinated before the age of five and things of that nature. I started to find supportive evidence. And then I wrote an outline of this book. And to make matters a little shorter, it was accepted by Simon & Schuster, which is a huge publisher. They changed the title because Psychic sounded too far away, you know, too California. So, they changed it to The Secret Life of the Unborn Child. And that was 1981 or 82, I forgot, but at that time, the large publishing houses like Simon & Schuster had lots of money. Nowadays they all complain about not having money. So, they sent me on a coast-to-coast publicity tour.
And when I was in Los Angeles, I met Dr. David Chamberlain and spoke to him, and the two of us really got along very well. And then I started writing to him saying, “Why don’t we make a presentation at the annual meeting of the American Psychological Association?” And we submitted a paper, but it was rejected, because at that time nobody believed in any of this. And so, I said rather unwisely, why don’t we form our own association? And David said, “Sure, if you arrange it, we’ll do it.” And so that’s what led to the birth of APPPAH — the Association for Prenatal and Perinatal Psychology and Health.
The Origins of APPPAH and a New Conversation About Prenatal and Birth Memory
Dr. Stephanie Dueger
And what happened with APPPAH?
Thomas R. Verny, MD
Well, what happened with APPPAH is that with no money at all, with my secretary and a few people who I gathered around me in Toronto, Canada, we arranged the first International Congress on pre- and perinatal psychology. That was before computers — all the invitation letters were typed out. And so, everybody who was anybody, like David Cheek and just hundreds of people from all over the world, were invited and they came. It was an incredible congress. We had something like 400 to 500 people, I have forgotten. At the end of the congress, David Chamberlain and I and a few of the other stalwarts got together and we formed, at that time, what was called the Pre- and Perinatal Psychology of North America, PANA, now APPPAH. I was elected as the first president. David Chamberlain and my wife, Sandra Collier, were vice presidents and then other positions were taken by other people, and we started the association. And that’s how it all started 40 years ago.
Dr. Stephanie Dueger
And it’s turned into APPPAH and is still going strong.
Thomas R. Verny, MD
Yes. We had our 40th anniversary meeting in Denver last fall [2023]. And I started the Association Journal two years later, JOPPPAH. And that has been going strong, and it’s getting better every year.
When Can Babies Start Forming Memories in the Womb?
Dr. Stephanie Dueger
Can you share a little bit of what you discovered about how it’s actually possible for babies to remember their time in utero and their births?
Thomas R. Verny, MD
Yeah, well that has always been the principal question really: How is it possible? So, at the time that I wrote The Secret Life of the Unborn Child, we had enough biological scientific evidence from well-researched places, some of the best universities, to show that by the end of the second trimester, about six months after conception, the unborn child had all the neurological neurons and cellular capacity to lay down memories. One could easily prove, for example, that myelination, although it was correctly thought to only finish at about five years, was not necessary for nerve conduction. It only increased the speed of nerve conduction. So even without myelin, and especially in a very, very small body, those unborn children were receiving signals almost instantly. And many other biological sorts of research showed that it is possible to lay down memories between six and nine months. That really was proven beyond a shadow of doubt. I was very satisfied with that.
What Is Cellular Memory, and Could It Help Explain Prenatal Memory?
Thomas R. Verny, MD
What I was not satisfied with was that there were children’s memories which seemed to be intact, which seemed to be supported by reports from other people, which went beyond — in other words, backwards in time — even to conception. And so there was nothing that I could find over the years until about nine years ago, let’s say a decade ago, around 2014, that could show how this is possible biologically.
Then I read in one of the scientific journals about a man in France, a 44-year-old Frenchman, who went to see his GP because he had a weakness in his left leg. And they did all kinds of studies on him. They did X-rays of his skull, and to their amazement they found that he had virtually no brain. He had a thin crescent of brain tissue and the rest was water, which is called hydrocephalus, water on the brain. Now this man was employed in the French Civil Service. He was the father of two children, and for all intents and purposes, except for this weakness in his left leg, he was fine.
So, a light bulb went on in my head. And I thought, how is this possible? I started once again looking to see whether there was any scientific evidence to support that. And I found actually that there were descriptions of many operations when young children or adults had epilepsy which would not leave them. There’s a kind of epilepsy that sometimes hits you five, six times a day instead of just once in three months or whatever. And the only treatment for that would be to take out that part of the brain which was causing the epileptic seizures. And sometimes doctors took out half the brain. And yet, not all, but many of the children and many of the adults who had this major operation continued to act and think and behave totally naturally.
So, then I started to think that there must be some other way in which we remember what happens in addition to the brain. I mean, obviously the brain is very important. And so, I started thinking along the lines that the rest of our body, below the neck, so to speak, is acting like a backup system, which perhaps we have in our computers, so that if something goes wrong with the computer, you can still find all the information on your backup disk.
And so, I started to look into the possibility of cellular memory. And it took seven years because it was very hard slogging. And I had to get into genetics, which I really didn’t know very much about, and quantum mechanics and all kinds of other things that really, I didn’t know or knew very little about, and put it all together. And that’s when I wrote The Embodied Mind, which essentially says that yes, the brain is very important, but also, we are connected to the rest of our bodies. And it’s really a network. Memory is a network. It’s like the WWW, the worldwide web network, except that it’s in your own system. And that actually goes very well with our modern way of thinking about computers and computing, because it’s not sort of the individual cell, but it’s all of them being connected that really makes the difference. So, that’s where I am at the moment.
Can Babies Hear Voices, Music, and Sounds During Pregnancy?
Dr. Stephanie Dueger
And so, for a little human coming into the world, they’re gestating in the pregnant parent’s body. Are they just getting information from the gestating parent or are they getting information from the outside world? And how is it getting laid down? In the spleen, in their lungs? What does that look like?
Thomas R. Verny, MD
Both. Well, they get their information, first of all, directly by listening. For a long time, it was thought that children, because as you well know they are in the amniotic sac so that they are surrounded by water, the amniotic fluid, and then the muscles of the mother, the abdomen, couldn’t hear anything inside the womb. But this has been proven totally wrong many, many years ago.
But, you know, the problem with academics and scientists and doctors is that they kind of stick to what they learned at university. So even 20 or 30 years later, any new information is kind of resisted. Once you learn, like I did, for example, that children before age X can’t learn anything, that’s what you believe. And no matter what other information comes in, you kind of resist it. So yes, the unborn child inside the mother’s abdomen can hear better than they can actually hear outside, because water actually increases conduction rather than decreasing it. So again, it was a false idea that scientists held for many, many years.
So, the baby in utero listens to the maternal heartbeat. It listens to the gastrointestinal noises as she eats. And it can hear sounds outside, and research has been done on this. You can put a microphone inside the womb, let’s say of a sheep, and you can hear sounds outside quite well — not perfectly, but quite well.
How a Pregnant Parent’s Stress, Emotions, and Environment Affect a Baby
Thomas R. Verny, MD
The other way in which the baby receives information is through the placenta and the circulation between the mother that goes through the placenta into the umbilicus of the child. So, all the hormones, for example, all the stress hormones, will be passing into the baby from the mother. So, the baby receives all those signals that you and I would receive from our bodies when we are under stress. Our heart might beat a little bit faster, blood pressure may go up, things of that nature. All those signals that the body interprets as stress, for example, the baby’s body interprets as stress too. It’s a combination of all those things, not one in particular.
The other thing that the unborn child receives is strong emotions. The unborn child can differentiate between love and hate, between very strong emotions. So, if a mother talks, for example, in a loving way to her unborn child, that baby is on some level able to receive that as a positive energizer of his or her system. If, on the other hand, the mother wants to abort the baby and has very negative feelings about the baby, the baby will receive that too. And if that child whose mother wanted to abort him is born, he or she is going to have difficulties, psychological difficulties, because on an unconscious level, they will carry that message forever in their unconscious.
How Talking, Singing, and Bonding During Pregnancy May Support Baby Development
Thomas R. Verny, MD
So, let me tell you a little story. I was interviewed by a journalist the other day, and she said, “When I had my first pregnancy, my husband was an intern in a hospital, and he was hardly ever home. The second pregnancy, four years later, he was home a lot because I guess he graduated. And he would talk to my baby every night.”
And I said, “Well, what would he say?”
And she said, “Well, you know, we had dinner, it’s a nice day, and we are going to listen now to some music, and you go to sleep and see you tomorrow. Something like that.”
Well, when this baby was born, the second child, my husband walked in and he came over to me. The baby was lying on my breast and he said, “Hi, Junior.” And the baby just looked at him and gave him this beautiful smile of recognition. And there was no doubt in anybody’s mind that baby recognized my husband’s voice. And PS, the relationship between my firstborn and my husband and my secondborn and my husband — very different. My secondborn, who prenatally bonded with my husband, has got a much better relationship.
So yes, children do learn in the womb about their parents, about the outside world, and connecting with them, bonding with them, talking to them, playing with them. All those things are very important.
Dr. Stephanie Dueger
That’s fascinating.
What This Means for Expectant and New Parents
One of the biggest takeaways from this conversation is that babies may be far more aware before birth than many of us were taught to believe. If unborn babies can hear, respond to repeated sounds, register stress, and begin laying down memories in utero, then pregnancy is not just a time of physical growth — it may also be a time of profound relational and emotional development. For expectant parents, that can be a powerful invitation to think of pregnancy as the beginning of connection, not simply the waiting period before parenting begins.
This perspective also highlights the potential importance of prenatal bonding. Talking to your baby, singing, playing familiar music, or simply taking a few moments to intentionally connect during pregnancy may help nurture a sense of familiarity and attachment even before birth. That doesn’t mean every parent needs to perform bonding perfectly or constantly narrate their day to their baby. It simply means that relationship can begin earlier than we once thought, and small moments of connection may matter.
At the same time, this conversation can deepen our understanding of how pregnancy experiences may shape early development. A pregnant parent’s stress, emotional state, environment, and support system all matter — not because parents need to create a perfectly calm pregnancy, but because babies are developing within a living relational environment. This is not a call for perfection or pressure. It’s a reminder that parents deserve care, support, safety, rest, and emotional resources too, because supporting the parent is also part of supporting the baby.
Perhaps most importantly, expectant and new parents do not need to walk away from this conversation feeling like every moment of pregnancy must be optimized. The takeaway is not perfection — it’s presence. Babies may be deeply receptive to connection, safety, and love, and parents benefit from those same things as well. A supported parent, a calmer environment, and moments of intentional connection can all be meaningful. If this research invites anything, it’s a more compassionate, connected view of pregnancy, birth, and the earliest beginnings of relationship. Stay tuned for Part 2 of this interview with Dr. Thomas Verny.
Closing Thoughts from Prepared for Parenthood
At Prepared for Parenthood, we believe that pregnancy, birth, and early parenthood deserve thoughtful, evidence-informed, and compassionate support. Conversations like this one invite us to widen our understanding of babies — not as passive passengers on the journey to birth, but as developing humans already participating in sensation, relationship, and connection.
If this conversation resonated with you, stay tuned for Part 2 of the interview. We also invite you to explore more Prepared for Parenthood resources on pregnancy, birth, postpartum healing, emotional wellbeing, and the earliest foundations of attachment. You do not have to do any of this perfectly. But you do deserve support, information, and space to move through parenthood with more confidence and care.
Frequently Asked Questions About Prenatal Memory, Bonding, and Baby Development
Can babies really hear you in the womb?
Babies can hear sounds during pregnancy, especially later in gestation. They may hear a pregnant parent’s heartbeat, internal body sounds, and muffled sounds from outside the womb, including voices and music.
Do babies remember what happens before birth?
This interview explores the possibility that babies may form early memories in utero, particularly in the second and third trimesters. While the science of prenatal memory is still evolving, many researchers in prenatal and perinatal psychology believe babies are more aware and receptive before birth than was once commonly believed.
Can babies recognize their parents’ voices after birth?
Many parents notice that newborns seem to respond to familiar voices after birth. The voice of the gestating parent, and other voices heard frequently during pregnancy, may feel familiar and comforting to a newborn.
Does talking or singing to my baby during pregnancy matter?
Talking, singing, reading aloud, or playing familiar music can be simple ways to begin bonding during pregnancy. These repeated sounds may create a sense of familiarity for your baby after birth.
Can stress during pregnancy affect a baby?
Stress during pregnancy is normal, and no parent needs to be stress-free to support their baby. At the same time, ongoing high stress, lack of support, and chronic overwhelm can affect both the pregnant parent and baby. This is one reason emotional support, rest, safety, and practical care during pregnancy matter so much.
Do I need to bond perfectly with my baby during pregnancy?
No. The goal is not perfection. You do not need to optimize every thought, feeling, or moment of pregnancy. Small, meaningful moments of warmth, safety, attention, and connection can matter.
What does this mean for expectant parents?
It means pregnancy can be seen not only as preparation for birth, but also as the beginning of relationship. Supporting the pregnant parent’s wellbeing, creating gentle moments of connection, and approaching pregnancy with compassion may support both parent and baby.
Some AI tools were used for the purpose of generating appropriate headings as well as information for the FAQ section in this article. All other writing came directly from the spoken interview on my podcast, The Prepared for Parenthood Podcast. All written content has been edited and verified for accuracy by this author.