Facing a (then) fear of eternal damnation for leaving my faith is probably what kept me a believer for so long. I finally couldn't accept the hipocracy, lies and ignorance of religion anymore. I couldn't see it as a loving thing anymore. It was too condemning and judgemental. I chose love. And science. Religion didn't fit in. I'm a happy agnostic now.

Being raised Assembly of God, mine is both. The only emotions I experienced in that church were fear and disgust. As young teen I drove my sunday school teacher crazy with questions concerning religion. She actually told the preacher that I was possessed by the devil. At 16yrs old, I'd had enough.

I did. It is very simple where I grew up. Tons of beliefs around.

Never believed.
Didn't even know religion existed til I started school. When I did hear about it all I could say was "you really believe this shit?"
Nothing since has altered that.

Pretty much escaped on my own. My beliefs had been eroding over the years when I largely decided that even if there was a god, you couldn't really connect to him/her/it through organized religions, which are all about controlling people and taking their money. Then a friend of mine whom I just met a few years ago would post a lot of stuff from an atheist group on Facebook and the more I looked at it, the more it just made sense.