That I was lied to by my mother and other family members my whole life and I bought into it because I trusted them, going so far as to force myself to believe well after leaving home on my own despite feeling like it was all bullshit from an early age. That and never getting the chance to tell my mom how I truly felt before she passed and now knowing she couldn't hear me now, even if I tried, because she no longer exists.

I have always been atheist, never had a problem with it growing up. My problem is the laws made in the name of religion. No law should be created based on the belief of a book. Laws should be created for what's best for the masses, inclusion of everyone, be based on scientific evidence, and to move humanity forward.

How imbued is our society, and even atheists and other agnostics, with christian values and beliefs. I am truly a stranger here.

My mom continues to make snide remarks about going to church. Oh wouldn't my life's so ugh better. She's praying for me.

I once read in a medical book that people who drink (alcohol) heavily from an early age may not mature in an emotional and intellectual way. I have seen this in alcoholics I have known. In many ways they can be almost childlike. Could religious indoctrination have a similar effect ?

I never 'became' an atheist. I was born that way.

I was raised by my Catholic family. The hardest situation was when I told my family that I didn't believe in their God anymore. So they stop talking to me for many years.

It's the concept of souls and afterlife that took me the longest to get rid of.

Loss of family.

It has not been hard for me...because I moved through many different religions and studied most of the others, or at least I informed myself about them. I found that when I got all that made any sense to me, about each religion, I moved on to something else! And I kept getting further and further away from religion! I always had questions that I tried to figure out and if I broached them with my religious peers...that only got me ‘put in my place!’ So finally, I succumbed to courage, and made claim to my disbelief...and life is working out as it should! But, on the other side now...I do not think that half of my life was wasted on religion...because I did keep my head above water..,and I know stuff about those religions and people, that you can’t learn from a book!

Nothing. To me these kinds of questions seem weird. I never really felt like this was a choice I was making. I just knew there wasn’t a god.

As long as I can remember I knew it was bullshit.

For me - it was the realization that there was no "safety net". No heaven. If I was wrong in my decision, then so be it.

Which was better than living a lie...

Another part was the loss of my best friend after I shared my conviction. Harsh awakening, but important for my development. I realized then I was in a minority. (and learning that helps one have empathy for other minorities.)

For me, it was the loss of eternal life.

I never believed that dribble, what’s hard to except is the level of cognitive dissonance and shock people have when they find out not only that I’m atheist but that i’m not going to play howtow to their whimsy.

For me it was that I had taken my first steps down a lonely road, and that when I turned around there wasn't a large group of similar minded people in my life, coming to the same conclusions and rejecting mysticism en masse, joining me on that lonely road.

I was too young to have a hardest thing. As I could argue and ask questions that caused consternation, most folk let me go my own way relatively quick. I have always been a loner -- prefer it to being part of a herd (or flock).

Raised Roman Catholic - which I have to admit - I really didn't enjoy. I know I always had that conversation in my head of "Do you really believe this? No you don't -you are faking it.".
Then agnostic (When I found out there was such a word in High School) for many years - until my sister in law said "Well you nephew needs to talk to you about the mass stabbing at his school because he's an atheist too".
I went "Oh- yes I guess somewhere in there I stopped believing entirely.". It was a relief. To realize I was out the other side.

I don't know that I was always an atheist, but I never was religious. I just never really thought about until I was in my late 20s. I didn't become an atheist so much as realized that I always had been.

I faked it for so many years just to shut my mom up that I can’t help but wonder how many others are doing the same. I liked the music but the rest was so obviously ridiculous that I would laugh during the sermon. You have no idea the number of dirty looks I received from the church ladies.

The hardest thing for me to accept is the blind following without understanding or questioning.

Not much to report, really. It was one of many huge fights I had with my dad as a youth, but that's about it. But from 18 I lived in Sydney, then in my 30's moved to Cambridge, then Manchester - all places where religious practice is not really the norm.

I've always been free from religion, so the hardest thing for me to accept as a young person was the fact that so many adults whom I respected at the time believed a giant dude in the sky would care who they had sex with

Getting past guilt over things which there is really no need to feel guilty about.

I'm not an atheist. I'm still unclear what IS an atheist, exactly. Someone who KNOWS for a certainty God doesn't exist? How is that possible?. I'm agnostic, and since I've always been shunned for this reason or that, I've had no problems whatsoever. All it gave me was a feeling of peace. I've been happier down deep inside the past few years than ever before in my life. And whatever the "truth" is I'll never know, and neither will anyone else. It's a great leveler; we're all in the same boat, regardless of what we "believe."

I'm one of those 40 years wasted dudes. Losing all my "friends and family" was traumatic but in the end freedom was worth everything.

Haven't made it that far but as an agnostic I fear death