“Apostasy”. I hate that word, I hate being described as an apostate but I suppose that’s what I am.

I was “born” a muslim. In fact according to Islam every child is a muslim upon birth. It is dependent on your parents whet

her or not you stay a muslim. Thus when someone converts from one religion to Islam to other muslims they have not converted they have reverted back to their original religion. How arrogant. I digress. For anyone reading this (doubt anyone does) first and foremost I want to make it clear that I am not a bigot however I hate Islam as a religion.

My doubts began at a young age. I can’t remember exactly when but I have very clear memories of having doubts as an eight year old. I was an inquisitive child, I loved to learn and I loved knowing the answer to everything. I read everything I could get my hands on and recall trying to memorise whole chunks of the encyclopaedias I was bought. It was only a matter of time before I started questioning the existence of god. My thoughts would turn round and round in circles “If god created everything, then who created god?”. I could not comprehend how god could possibly exist. I was scared of these thoughts, I knew they were wrong and I knew I shouldn’t question an adult about them. It took me another five years before I would fully reject my faith.

As a british muslim to learn about Islam I was sent to mosque five days a week for two hours. Here we would learn how to read arabic so we could read the Quran correctly and how to pray in arabic. We were never taught how to understand it only how to read it. As I got older the mosque expanded and they started teaching us about the Prophet and some of the tenets of Islam. The boys and girls were separated as we got to certain ages and as a girl I was expected to cover up more and more as I got older. Questions were discouraged and we were asked about our parents faithfulness and told all about the things they were doing that was against Islam.

I started being afraid of my own thoughts and would try really hard not to question the creation of god because I thought that god could see into my mind and I would go to hell for doubting. As I developed and started masturbating and exploring my body I would feel guilty and disgusting because I thought god could see me doing these dirty things. I started to feel like I was being watched every time I done something that was against islam.

I wasn’t scared of witches or monsters. I was scared of judgement day, the dajjal and going to hell. I was scared of my parents and my sister going to hell. Some information before I go on. The dajjal is Al-Masih ad-Dajjal or in english the false messiah or the deceiver (kind of like the antichrist in christianity). He will appear before the day resurrection and will be known to believers with the word Kafir (disbeliever) engraved on his forehead. Many people believe that the dajjal will be here soon as many of the signs Muhammad said would indicate his emergence have appeared.

I had nightmares of the dajjal, in all of them he would be going door to door and my mum would answer the door to him. She would not realise who it was and he would pose a choice to her and in every dream she made the wrong choice and went to hell. For a long time I always had this stupid fear of my mum answering the door when someone knocked.

I was also scared of dying because of the punishment in the grave. Muslims believe that once you die you are “alive” in the grave until judgement day and dependant on how you lived your life you will receive certain punishments such as being burnt, swimming in a river of blood, having your head smashed with a rock etc.. You know all of that fun stuff.

I was scared of judgement day because I always pictured it as me being up in front of everyone I knew naked with a video of my life being played from beginning to end for everyone to see.

Fucking hell I spent a lot of my childhood scared of things that didn’t exist.

As I started getting older I pulled away from my faith more and more. Just before I left it completely I gave being religious a go but I still couldn’t make myself believe in god so I officially became an ex-muslim. It was very anti-climatic except I could do things without guilt for a change. I went through a period of finding a religion or belief system that fitted with what I believed and cycled between being some form of nature loving wiccan pagan hybrid to being agnostic. Now at 23 years old I’m comfortable as an atheist-agnostic.

I still live two lives in part. The me I am with my family and the “real” me. The “real” me is a non-religious pork eating, alcohol drinking, fornicating young woman. The family me is not religious at all unless I’m required to be at funerals and such like. I don’t drink, I don’t eat pork, I’m a 23 year old virgin and my partner is becoming a “muslim” so my parents accept our relationship. They know he isn’t really going to believe in islam and yet they insist. Culture is a funny thing. Sometimes I feel like screaming at the top of my lungs that I am not a muslim anymore and if they don’t accept it then they can get to fuck but I love my family and don’t want to cut ties with them or make things weird.

IF I ever have children however the truth will come out unless I just decide to tell them before that. My children will not be raised in a religion regardless of whether it means losing my family.

Anyway that was my riveting story of becoming an apostate.