Hell Is Real: I've Been There And Back

[JohnnieNaked]

I apologize in advance, because this is going to be very very long.

CHILDHOOD FEARS:

I grew up in a small town, with a borderline atheist father and a believing mother. I first accepted Jesus into my heart at 6 years old, when a fundamentalist babysitter was asked by my mother to explain it all to my sister and I (she is two years younger). I attribute this brief moment in time to struggles with obsessive compulsive disorder, anxiety, and depression that are ongoing to this day. It wasn't so bad that the babysitter introduced us to God, as it seemed to me god was quite a good guy being he created us and all, but she had to add some total bullshit in there for good measure. She also said that 'if we were to challenge the devil, we would explode.'

 

Now, say what you will, but to an impressionable 6 year old with a wild imagination this hit pretty hard. I remember spending most of the next two days on a swing in the school playground (our house was right next to the school) obsessing over it. I wasn't sure that it was true, but man it scared me to death. I didn't want to explode! But at the same time I credit my younger self with a brass pair, because I wanted to say it to prove it wasn't true. I just wanted the fear to leave. I don't think I said it then, and I quickly forgot about it.

 

Living in a small town has advantages and disadvantages. One advantage being you know everyone and everything about them. A major disadvantage being the level of education is low, and people make up shit ALL THE TIME. Around the same age, I remember some of the kids talking about Satan, and how one of the kids lived in a family of devil worshippers. I made up a story on the spot (remember, I had quite the imagination) about how the devil appeared to me in a mirror with smoke and flame and spoke to me. One of the older girls told me how great a danger I was in. Looking back it's quite amusing to me now, but at the time it made me really believe that there was this devil, who was pure evil. Obviously I didn't think my own made up story was true, but the fear of the supernatural was becoming more and more cemented in my emotions. I had night terrors a lot of my childhood. I remember one night an enormous reptilian hand covered my face as I slept. It must have been hypnagogic trance or something, but it seemed very real.

 

I remember my mother taking us to a fire and brimstone church for our years in that town. I don't remember much of it. All I know is it was very fucking boring.

THE FEARS RETURN

 

We moved away when I was about 10 years old, to a much larger city. I was an outcast from the beginning. I never fit in with these cool city kids wearing designer jeans with their city lingo. People seemed so much meaner compared to my old town where everyone was friends and judgements about clothing were never even thought of. A couple of years after this (I was about 12 or 13) I remember vividly sitting on my bed before sleep just thumbing through the Bible. And it came back: "If you challenge the devil you will explode." Fuck. I remember the cold stinging icicles of fear penetrating my body. I felt as if the devil himself was there tempting me to say it. So began the obsession. From the time I woke up until the time I went to bed I obsessed about it. What if I said it? What would happen? I tried everything to get it to go away. I quoted "If god be for us, who can be against us?" at least 200 times a day. What began as instant relief slowly faded into the realization this was here to stay. My faith wasn't strong enough. I needed better verses to combat the temptations. "Resist the devil and he will flee from you." That one works for a couple weeks. I even broke down in front of my mom about it in hysterical tears. Her laughter made me feel a little better. Finally, after a year of daily obsessing, having this fear take over my life, I had had enough. I said FUCK IT, and said it. Nothing happened. I KNEW nothing would happen, but fuck it was such a relief anyway. I had to sa it at least 200 times before the fear went away. This particular obsession went away, but soon new fears and obsessions crept into my mind.

 

The first one was aliens. I would wake up in terror over aliens. I read somewhere that they were demonic and that quoting the Bible made them go away. Then mental illness when I was about 17. I was obsessed over mental illness/demonic influence and was convinced I had every mental illness under the sun. These went on back and forth for about 2 years.Around this same time I had an 'experience' after asking Jesus to come into my heart. I saw the light, and felt my guilt removed. I never really went to church after that, because to me it was just good enough that I was saved, I didn't want to do much of anything else, and I thought Christian people were both judgemental, strange and boring. My afterlife was secure, that's all I really cared about.

 

Soon after this, the big one came, DEMONIC POSSESSION.

 

It hit me like a ton of bricks. It was the scariest thing my brain could possibly imagine. After almost having a nervous breakdown about it, I asked a devout man, and he said 'you belong to God, it can't happen to you' and that one phrase did so much to alleviate my torment that I used it for close to a decade. Every time I had the intrusive fear of being possessed, I recited "I belong to god" or "be gone from me satan" and it would be relieved for an hour or two. But what if I ASKED to be possessed? That went on for 2 more years. I was so scared of it. Eventually, I broke down and 'asked.' Nothing happened. Nothing at all. So as a big FUCK YOU to my fears, I asked whenever I felt compelled. Nothing ever happened obviously. Throughout these years I would often wake suddenly in the middle pf the night convinced the rapture had just come and I was left behind. I drove the major love of my life away because we had sex (great fucking sex) outside of wedlock.

 

THE REAL DOUBTS BEGIN

 

This went off and on for the last decade or so. ABout a year ago, I started to have doubts I was saved. Like the virus that it is, obsessive compulsive disorder attacks your certainties. I was certain I couldn't be possessed because I was saved, so naturally that OC part of my brain started to question my salvation. In the Summer of 2009, I started having real doubts. I read somewhere that real Christians are only real Christians if they ACT like them. If you don't act like one, then you were probably never saved to begin with. I started reading vociferously. Everything I could get my hands on. I came to two different streams of Christianity. One was 'you can lose your salvation' and the second was 'you were never saved.' It was one or the other, I decided, because I loved sex, getting drunk, swearing, playing poker, playing rock music, heavy metal, yet at the same time I always ALWAYS had a tremendous amount of God-guilt over it. I started going to church, I started reading the Bible, I begged God for hours and hours to save me all day and all night. I drove myself to the absolute depths of despair. I stopped talking to my friends, I stopped doing anything I enjoyed, I had to be saved. It was the only thing that mattered. I found a website on how to find out if you are saved and started watching. Nothing helped. I could not be consoled until something fucking happened. So after a couple of months of total agony, I had an experience at work. It makes no logical sense to me other than I forced myself to have it. I realized everything all at once (which was just doctrine I had understood before anyway) and I became convinced I was saved. I was hysterical. For a brief moment I actually think I lost control of my mind. It's scary to me now, because I have never had anything happen like that before. I was absolutely euphoric, but not in a good way. It was an odd kind of uncontrollable emotional explosion, and looking back it DID NOT feel good.

 

ANyways, I started to see a counsellor and he was convinced I had 'something following me' because of my teenage drug use, so he started deliverance prayers and that only made me feel worse.

 

GOD IS NOT THERE

 

After putting it aside for a while, I decided I had gone too far and needed to get back to reality. I felt like I had lost my mind, and I was not going to let this bullshit take me down. I knew it was all bullshit, thank goodness my mind was strong enough, it was ALWAYS throughout this entire ordeal sending itself logical flaws in the way I was thinking. If it wasn't for these thoughts (How can god be all loving if he allows evil, etc.) I think I would have gone completely insane. It was also these thoughts that made me seek Christian debunking arguments. In the past 6 months I can honestly say I have read almost everything there is to read on Christinity and atheism and I have come to the conclusion that Christianity is bullshit.

 

The Bible is full of errors and contradictions. There are no demons. Hell is immoral (I always thought this, FWIW). Paul was a raving lunatic.

 

I have to say it still makes me unconfortable to say those things because I am still deprogramming and I am still afraid of god. I feel a little lost as well, but it seems to be gett8ing better. My mind seems to be healing.

 

Anyway, that's my story. To hell and back. As of now I am very depressed. I feel like I lost a lot of the better years of my life because of the religious fears that drove me. I am trying to claw my way out of the thorns that still infest my mind and emotions. I am still trying to find myself, the real me that I used to know so well but over the past year forced myself to hate to get into a heaven that doesn't exist.

 

Through all of this I always wondered why God never answered and now I know...

 

 

GOD IS NOT THERE.

[agnosticator]

Wow! That is quite an ordeal you went through. I think it is criminal to abuse anyone at such an early age. Those Christians know to get 'em when they are young...I ruined my teen and young adult years, but at least I escaped. Many don't ever awaken from the stupor.

 

Have you read THE MIND OF THE BIBLE BELIEVER by Edmund Cohen? It's an examination of the psychological manipulations of the Bible. It might help you put the crap stewing in the back of your mind to rest. Also, LEAVING THE FOLD by Marlene Winell(sp.?)

 

Welcome to the site. I think you'll love it here!

[JohnnieNaked]

Wow! That is quite an ordeal you went through. I think it is criminal to abuse anyone at such an early age. Those Christians know to get 'em when they are young...I ruined my teen and young adult years, but at least I escaped. Many don't ever awaken from the stupor.

 

Have you read THE MIND OF THE BIBLE BELIEVER by Edmund Cohen? It's an examination of the psychological manipulations of the Bible. It might help you put the crap stewing in the back of your mind to rest. Also, LEAVING THE FOLD by Marlene Winell(sp.?)

 

Welcome to the site. I think you'll love it here!

 

Thanks, ya. Religion is psychological warfare and the worst kind of emotional manipulation there is. I love you but I'm going to torture you forever unless you do exactly what I say. I'll definitely check out those books.

[Galien]

Yuck Johnnie, sounds identical to my experience. Christianity is a pure mindfuck to obsessive people. Run away. We deserve better. The good thing about having been to hell and back, is that there is nothing left to be scared of, except fundies and paparazzi, who should be shot on sight.

 

Even in my mid twenties I was still afraid to be in a house by myself in case the demons came to get me. Frigging fucking asshole christians.

[dB-Paradox]

Welcome to the forums, Johnnie. That's a lot of crap to deal with! And that you were introduced to such a fear at such a young age...just horrible! That's one of the reasons I don't want my wife indoctrinating my daughters to such a thing. (My daughters are 4 and 1.) Anyway, hang in there. I think the "deprograming" thing is an ongoing thing. Maybe it'll get easier, I don't know. I've been "officially" out for nearly a year, and it's still something that creeps up on me once in a while. But I think the longer you have to re-learn to use your brain, the better it gets.

[Dagan]

Welcome! And that wasn't that long.

 

Sorry to hear the fear of hell had you so tight. I guess that's why the idea persists -- it really grabs people. Worked on me for 25 years of my life. Then -- like you say -- I realized it was immoral and didn't make any sense.

[Franko47]

I think there will come a time, and it may require some cultural maturity and legal clarity, where indoctrinating small children with serious religious fears may be "illegal". In my mind it's a form of abuse; and I fail to understand that many religious parents can't see that. Are they so obsessed with this stuff that they will even risk the mental and emotional well-being of their small children ? Is nothing fucking sacred ? They have all the time in the world to grow up, learn proper morals and values, and make their own decisions about religion and belief.