An Italian man has been struggling to adjust to daily life following a hit-and-run accident that put him in a coma and ultimately erased 39 years worth of memories, including his own family.

Imagine living in the 1980s and then suddenly being transported to present day. Things like smartphones, self-driving cars, artificial intelligence, the internet or social media must seem like real-life science fiction, and everyone you used to know is now either gone or much older. It sounds like the plot of a Hollywood movie, but it’s the life story of Luciano d’Adamo, an Italian man who lost the last 39 years of memories following a hit-and-run accident in 2019. After waking up from a coma a few days later, he was convinced he was 24 years old and waiting to be married to his 19-year-old fiance; he didn’t recognize the old woman claiming to be his wife, the 30-something man calling him ‘dad’, or the old man staring back at him from the mirror.

Photo: Tumisu/Pixabay

When Luciano d’Adamo saw his own face for the first time after waking up from the coma, he was terrified. He was supposed to be a young man with big dreams, not some old man who looked barely able to take a few steps without gasping, let alone take on the world. The woman calling herself his wife was 58, but he only remembered his 19-year-old fiancee. They turned out to be the same person, only 39 years apart, and that was something Luciano couldn’t comprehend. Where had the years gone, why was he a grey-haired man, and what had happened to all his memories?

“She called me ‘Luciano’ and I wondered how she knew my name,” the Italian man recalled. “Later, a 35-year-old man also showed up, but how could a man born long before me be my son? And then what wife? I wasn’t married, but engaged, and certainly not to that woman who must have been almost sixty, but to a 19-year-old girl, in fact the wedding had already been arranged, we were going to get married four months later.”

Five months after the tragedy that changed his life forever, Luciano is still trying to come to terms with the fact that he will most likely never get back any of the memories of the last four decades. His wedding, his son’s entire life, his friends, and his career, they are all gone for good and there is nothing he can do but accept it. That is easier said than done, though, and the Italian man is still working on it. He had to start a relationship with his wife and son basically from scratch, decypher the mysteries and wonders of the modern world and try to piece together all the things that happened in the 39 years he forgot.

Luciano d’Adamo now works as a maintenance man in a school, an environment that has allowed him to find a sense of normalcy ina world he understands very little about. Spending his days among children has given him a new perspective and a source of joy, and he loves nothing more than to chat with them and their parents. With the help of psychologists, he is also trying to rebuild relationships with his family and friends.

The fascinating case of Luciano d’Adamo has attracted the attention of the scientific community at an international level. The uniqueness of his situation and his remarkable capacity to adapt to an almost completely foreign reality has stunned experts the world over.

The person who caused the hit-and-run in 2019 and changed Lucians’ life forever was never identified.