I was born into a Christian home (my father is a pastor), and from an extremley young age I was taught about the Christian faith. My parents took every precaution to make sure I accepted the Bible as infallible truth. They went so far as to not ever tell me about Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, Tooth Fairy, etc. in fears that when I found out those were fake I would suspect Christianity to be fake as well.

I can't even remember when I first said I accepted Jesus, but it was very early in life. Throughout my childhood my parents made sure I was extemley fearful of anything besides the one "true" Christian faith. When I first played The Legend of Zelda: The Ocarina of Time I was so scared of the Poe Ghosts being evil agents of the devil that I actual forbid myself to play the game anymore. This happened with many other things as well, one hint of the supernatural besides Christianity and I would become extremley nervous and avoid watching the movie/reading the book/playing the game in fear of some evil spiritual attack on me from the devil. I always attended public school, but all the teacher's in the small town I lived in were Christian and imposed their religious views on the classroom.

It was then (at age 15) that I moved out of state into what I would consider a normal town. My parents put me in an extremley small Christian school, in hopes it would help me meet new people easier, and obviously to shelter me from the public schools.

Until about age 16 I never even questioned my religious faith. Living in a very small and extremley Christian/conservative town the majority of that time helped me stay brainwashed all those years I suppose. It was around this age that I finally discovered what mastrubation was. I also discovered that there were others that shared my same somewhat odd fetish (macrophilia) via my newfound access to the internet. Obviously I began to flog the dolphin at this point, which plagued me with extreme guilt. Added to that guilt was the fear of my fetish being strange, and some sort of "extra" abomination to God. This eventually became some insane and entrapping problem for me. I felt that I could feel demons in my room after I finished the deed, which let me to extreme guilt, and a feeling of worthlessness.

This feeling of worthlessness led me to become somewhat anti-social, and I withdrew from people and lived a sad, confusing life for the next year or so. Somewhere around this time, a friend from my old town converted to atheism. I was outraged, and did everything I could to proove to him he was wrong. He provided me with counterpoints though, and links to sites that argued against the existance of God. This was when I first began to really question my faith.

It was when I my dad went on a mission trip that my faith finally broke. My real last hope in the religion was that there was so much conversion going on through missionaries in third world countries that Christianity had to be real. When my dad returned, he told us how the pastor down in Peru had told him how they believed the faith because of the amazing miracles happening in the US. That did it, they thought the US had amazing miracles, and we thought they did. Of course, I still couldn't admit to myself that I didn't actually believe at this point.

Somewhere in here I came to the conclusion that I believed in evolution because it was so well suported by facts (facts which my Christian schooling convientently hid from me). Of course, I sorta assumed God had started it and used it as a tool to create life or soemthing.

Eventually I broke free of my guilt thing going on with mastrubation by coming to the conclusion that there was nothing wrong with it. It's a normal and healthy activity for teenagers and young adults with sexual tension. Next it dawned on me that I really didn't find premarital sex to be a bad idea. This was in contradiction of what I had been taught to believe. This was the last step towards my deconversion.

Finally, at this point I realized I was just lying to myself when I said I believed in Christianity. The Bible is full of stupid contradictions, ridiculous rules, and monomythic elements. I finally realized that I wasn't a Christian, and decided I was going to accept that. I have only told a few people, and I have also told someone about my fetish. Telling people these things has really helped free me from my imaginary bonds I had placed myself in, and I feel better now than I have in a very long time, probably since I moved here. I can't wait for college (I start this fall), and a new start at a social life without my guilt and feelings of worthlessness getting in the way.

Typing this out and knowing someone will read it has helped me out alot. I doubt I'll ever be able to be open about these things with my devoutly religious parents which is unfortunate, since I'd really like them to know who I am without them condemning me, but I guess life can't be perfect. Oh well, and thanks for reading this all.

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