ANDY Wray woke up in hospital unable to remember anything about himself – not his name or how he liked his coffee or the harrowing suicides he had dealt with as a policeman.

Traumatised by his job, he had hit mental breaking point.

His brain had wiped itself clean of experiences as a form of self-defence, leaving Andy to start from scratch.

It is almost three years since the breakdown but it was only a few months ago that Andy's brain developed the ability to store memories permanently.

The 32-year-old, of Thames Way, Hilton, said it was as though life had just started.

He said: "It's like I've been dropped into the world again."

The mental problems which triggered Andy's breakdown built up over several years.

He dealt with several suicides and other horrific events while working for the police in Cambridgeshire but instead of dealing with the trauma, he tried to ignore it.

He said: "Instead of going home and talking about it I buried it away and a couple of years later it came back to bite me."

The strain caused him to quit the force and he started working at Tesco while trying to set up his own business as a courier.

But in April 2007 he developed a severe headache and dizziness so set off to Colchester General Hospital.

Nurses found him wandering around without any clue of who he was or how he had got there.

He was sent to the neighbouring mental health hospital where he stayed for the next four to five months.

There he was diagnosed with the rare condition dissociative amnesia, meaning he had forgotten his past to protect himself from difficult memories.

He said: "Staff would ask me what day of the week it was and I wouldn't have a clue. I would not even understand that there were days of the week called Monday to Sunday.

"I could clean my teeth and go to the toilet and I understood that you would pick up an apple and bite into it, but I wouldn't know whether or not I liked the taste of it and I wouldn't know you shouldn't eat the core."

Mental health experts pieced together the cause of Andy's breakdown by speaking to his friends, family and former police colleagues.

They pinpointed the trigger as two particularly harrowing suicides which he had dealt with as a policeman – a teenager in a car and a woman on a train track.

Andy said: "Friends and family have told me that I started to struggle with the job after those events.

"To this day I still have nightmares about policing."

After a few months of treatment and recovery, Andy began to form memories which would last for a day or two.

He was discharged from hospital but still needed regular care because his memory had not returned.

To help cope with life outside the hospital, he had a book filled with photos of his friends, along with a description of how he knew them.

He said: "I'd look at it before I'd go training with my running club so that I would recognise people.

"I would get so anxious and stressed about meeting people."

He took his biggest step forward in November last year when, quite suddenly, his brain developed the ability to form permanent new memories.

Andy has a few theories about why this happened.

It could have been due to a change in the anti-depressants he was taking, his decision to take a break from running or the start of his relationship with partner Jennifer Spencer – his reason for moving to Derbyshire.

Andy is still struggling with the fact that everything that happened to him before November remains a blank.

He often pretends that he knows more than he really does because it makes life easier.

He only has a limited interest in trying to retrieve his past.

Jennifer said many people were still confused by Andy's condition.

She said: "People wonder how he can talk about things that happened three years ago when he's lost his long-term memory.

"He can't actually remember those things from when they happened, he's just reporting what he's been told."

Now the pair are looking forward to the future.

This weekend, Andy will begin his personal challenge of running 80 races in 80 countries to raise money for mental health charity Mind.

He will start with the Nottingham to Derby Kilomathon on Sunday and hopefully finish in Australia in two years, with support from Jennifer all the way.

A spokeswoman for Mind said: "From marathons to dressing up as a giant stressball, Andy has been one of our most committed supporters.

"We are over the moon that he has made such a good recovery and that it has prompted him to take on such an innovative challenge."

The charity has featured him in a video and last week he was invited to London to a ceremony celebrating 40 years of its royal patronage.

He said: "It was so exciting. I had a few minutes with Princess Alexandra and she was intrigued by the 80 races."

Jennifer said of the visit: "It was like looking around London with a 12-year-old. He'd ask 'what's that big clock?' and I'd tell him it was Big Ben."