My story (and struggle with mental illness)

Here is how I began to believe in CT´s

In order to understand the present, I must tell you a bit of my history. I grew up in a very strict household. I was hit as a child if I was naughty and always had to portray maturity form a very young age, or else I would be punished. This meant that I was at many times as a child fearful of the adults around me that were supposed to treat me well.

Also, at the age of around 4 to 6 I was sexually abused, I felt dirty. Then when I began secondary school I was bullied. I was continuously bullied for the next 6 years. I tried to tell my up bringers about this but they just sort of said ´man up´ and did nothing about it. I then started to feel as though I was dirty again and did not like to talk about being bullied. In about the 5th year of being abused at school I snapped and threw a sharp object at the head of one of the bullies (there were quite a few) and of course I was the one who got in trouble.

This made me really resent the school system. All this time they did nothing while I was bullied and only stepped in when i finally snapped only to punish me? The following year I dropped out of college (the college was in the same school grounds with the same bullies). I had also started taking marijuana and the occasional other drug to cope with the continuous harassment and feeling of anxiety of being harassed about two years before I dropped out.

Pardon my chronology as there is a lot to cover. Anyway I then got hit by the up bringers (I would rather not refer to them as parents as I do not think they deserve this title) and of course I was blamed for just being a bad person and drug user(not taking into account why and how) So anyway I then had to work horrible stressful jobs to make ends meet as a college drop out and to support myself in a new college.

The horrible jobs only exacerbated my drug use again as a coping mechanism. I began to experiment with other drugs too. Around this time I began to look into conspiracy theories. Looking back it was probably as a result of not being able to cope with the shitty reality of my life. I wanted to find a different reality. After finishing at the new college (with not good grades as I was working two jobs on average and being mentally abused by the up bringers and so not ever really having time to relax for years by this point) I then had to work to support myself again before going to university.

The work was basically slave labour and was incredibly stressful. So stressful in fact that I damaged my wrist joints and would wake up in the middle of the night and re enact the work tasks in a confused state. This again exacerbated my drug usage of marijuana as it was the only way I could get to sleep. I became extremely paranoid and believed in the JFK conspiracy theory among others and thought that secret government agents where trying to kill me.

I quit my job and ran away into nature for a year excessively using marijuana and professing conspiracy theories. Eventually my life was threatened several times and so I had to return to the fucked up society with the fucked up up bringers (as I could not afford to go anywhere else) and so the mental abuse continued. I by some miracle managed to stop taking drugs and enrol in a university. I became an A student on average.

I completely denounced all conspiracy theories and my mental ability was very good at this point. Unfortunately I still could not afford a place of my own and really could not stand being mentally abused much longer. I joined the army reserves to try to stay disciplined and drug free as well as try to save up money to get my own place.

Unfortunately the training I did was very extreme (one of if not the hardest training in the British army) As a reserve we had to learn 1 years worth of knowledge in about 4 weeks!! I had another nervous breakdown and sort of became catatonic. No matter how hard I tried I could not memorise anything I read and consequently went from an A student to an F student, eventually failing university altogether I also began to heavily use cocaine and amphetamines to try to cope with all the stress in my life at this point.

Eventually I became homeless and with no supportive family members. In desperation I would burn tires to stay warm at night and so got arrested for arson and spent the next 6 months in prison. This really was the most horrible experience of my life. Being in prison with mental health problems was literally like hell.

Anyway after all the shit that I experienced my mental health was very bad. And to add insult to injury the prison released me to the house of the up bringers even though i profusely asked to be sent to a half way home or even just stay longer in prison Really the mental abuse, constant berating, not allowing me to relax day or night, sleep deprevation and threats was too much i didn't want to experience another second of it.

Anyway without any other option that is the house I was sent BACK to. My mental health as you can imagine only deteriorated further. I began to believe in CT´s again but on a whole new (David Icke) level. I also starved myself and drank only my own urine and some fruit juice for almost 3 weeks because I believed so strongly in the most extreme of CT´s and other crazy theories. I also sun gazed and now have solar retinopathy to boot.

At times I was rational and would try to re enrol in university or apply for work to be able to leave the shitty existence in the up bringers house and support myself. However, I was unqualified and not eligible to return to university because I was told I had my chance and blew it.

So now I cannot find work to be independent but cannot become qualified because the financial body is the same for every university in England, plus some of my credits can only be accounted for and added to by the same university that will not take me back!!

I would say that i have been suicidal at many points in my life too. If I knew a fool proof way to end my life without having to live with unsucessful attempt results I probably would not my here today.

So anyway, as I hope you can understand, my fixation with bunk has not been optional. Extreme mental stress put my mind into a completely skewed viewpoint of reality. The drug use used to cope with undiagnosed mental illness also probably did not help much (although it was a dark necessity).

there are alot more fucked up experiences that have happened throughout my life. As i did not feel up to writing an essay for my first post I have not included everything.

For example, when I was bullied my life was threatened and this was also a reason for me dropping out. Also the constant harrasment gave me breakdown at that time during which it was impossible for me to study or learn, similar to my catatonic breakdown years later.

Also when i was homeless i lived in a brothel for sometime (interesting how drug users and prostitutes, the so called dreggs of society where the only ones to offer a helping hand) and witnessed horrible abuse of both men and women.

Also i was physically attacked many times whilst i was homeless and could have been violently killed.
I guess it is a miracle I am still here.

Anyway the point of this post is to say that there are many more traumatic events that have occured to me throughout my life, not only the ones highlighted above.

Also i should probably mention the reason for this post is to bring awareness to the possibility that CT believing can be attributed to ill mental health as this was a prominent reason for my believing.

I think it would be interesting research if a neuroscientist studied the differences in brain activities of people who believe in a lot of conspiracy theories vs people who tend to be skeptics. In my experience with an elderly family member CT-believer, I initially thought that that all the CT beliefs held by this person was a sign of senility until I learned that a lot of these beliefs are widespread and held by young people as well. In the case of my family member, it may not be senility, but there is definitely something different going on in the mind than there used to be and it's getting worse with age.

interesting proposition. I am still relatively young (less than 35).

However, for me I cannot attribute my CT beliefs or mental health as deteriorating with age. There have been times when it was much better in my mid twenties as compared to a much younger age.

In my opinion the environment you are in (stress, abuse, e.t.c) has more of a correlation with the deterioration of mental health than age or aging.

However, Old age is probably a whole different ball game. Still take into consideration the enviroment/ lifestyle your family member has. this could be a factor IMO (in my opinion).