i was brainwashed by a 'friend' and her family [I Was Brainwashed]
i met a girl out in the midwest area of the us when i was around 9. for convenience, ill call her sara (not her real name). sara was like three years older then me, but we hit it off extremely well, and she accepted me for who i was. my father and i didnt stay in the area long due to his occupation, but sara and i kept in touch via text. for a while, we kept texting each other, with sara offering and asking if i could stay at her place for a while. eventually, my dad has to do a big, time sensitive job, and decides to leave me with sara and her family for a month, right around my 10th birthday.
what my dad didnt know was that sara and her family basically believed in every factually incorrect ideology there is. everything from flat earth, to anti-vax, to space landing conspiracies. theyd probably even buy the 5g conspiracy if it was a thing at that time. over the course of that month, they not only made me believe all the backwards concepts they believed, but also made me unable to trust those who didnt believe what i was taught. a councilor i saw after this thinks i also blocked out alot of traumatic incidents from when i was there
going back to my father was tough. i was a blind believer in anything sara or her family said. when i learned my dad didnt believe what sara told me, i began to defy him. id refuse to accept anything he said or told of me. to make matters worse, i started voice chatting with sara on a constant basis. whenever dad would tell me something that sara didnt agree with, she would tell me 'dont listen to him, i know whats right. just listen to me' and those words would ring through my skull and blind me from the truth.
my dad didnt stop me from this behavior until he took me to get vaccinated for something (at this point i was a couple months shy of 11), and i refused to cooperate. i had what was easily the biggest meltdown ive ever had. i was forcibly cut off from sara, and received extensive treatment. it took a couple of months to realize just how messed up i became. my mind hasnt fully recovered from what sara and her family did, but its not blindly followed uneducated madness anymore.
what my dad didnt know was that sara and her family basically believed in every factually incorrect ideology there is. everything from flat earth, to anti-vax, to space landing conspiracies. theyd probably even buy the 5g conspiracy if it was a thing at that time. over the course of that month, they not only made me believe all the backwards concepts they believed, but also made me unable to trust those who didnt believe what i was taught. a councilor i saw after this thinks i also blocked out alot of traumatic incidents from when i was there
going back to my father was tough. i was a blind believer in anything sara or her family said. when i learned my dad didnt believe what sara told me, i began to defy him. id refuse to accept anything he said or told of me. to make matters worse, i started voice chatting with sara on a constant basis. whenever dad would tell me something that sara didnt agree with, she would tell me 'dont listen to him, i know whats right. just listen to me' and those words would ring through my skull and blind me from the truth.
my dad didnt stop me from this behavior until he took me to get vaccinated for something (at this point i was a couple months shy of 11), and i refused to cooperate. i had what was easily the biggest meltdown ive ever had. i was forcibly cut off from sara, and received extensive treatment. it took a couple of months to realize just how messed up i became. my mind hasnt fully recovered from what sara and her family did, but its not blindly followed uneducated madness anymore.
