Real Exorcism Stories: Encounters With Possession

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4 hours ago

It's hard to fathom, but about 40% of the U.S. population believes in the existence of demons. On the r/AskReddit subreddit, u/physioz and u/yamladfdgdfghfh on the r/Christianity subreddit asked people to share personal experiences with exorcisms and demonic possession. Here are their bone-chilling stories:
"The high school I went to was a religious private school. During my senior year, it was tradition for the entire senior class to go on a religious retreat at this remote mountain resort. The point of the retreat was to grow closer to each other as a class and find God. On the third day, everyone was in the main hall. A girl toppled to the floor. Everyone stared. She writhed around and screamed. It wasn't her scream. It was like a deep voice screamed inside her. Then she stood up and started yelling in 'tongues.' Her eyes rolled back. She ran around the hall. I honestly thought this was a dumb high school prank to freak everyone out. The teachers tried calming her down, but she kept screaming in this weird language. One of the teachers called an ambulance. Another teacher tried to take her by the shoulders. She dug her nails into his arm, hard. It took several more minutes to calm her down, and then she just...went quiet."
"My friend and I are Mexican. My friend's mom believed that someone had put a curse on her. In her village, you'd hire a curandero or brujo for this stuff. One paid her a house visit, and it turned out that she had been cursed. According to him, a jealous ex-lover of her husband had put a pretty wicked one on her. He said he would perform a ritual that night to dispel the evil, but she had to relax and close her eyes completely, because he was going to summon a great spirit who was not supposed to be seen by humans, or something like that. The brujo does all his business while her daughter (my friend) is there for support. The brujo starts chanting, and the room becomes heavy and loud, gradually building up. She couldn't see anything because her eyes were closed, but she felt a presence in the room. Then she heard growling and howling and all sorts of animalistic noises. The brujo said he had found a willing wolf spirit to trace and eliminate the curse.
"I dated someone for a few years with dissociative identity disorder who often became 'possessed' by these strange entities that consist of many mythological species and often had fantasy-style names. Elves, vampires, werewolves, you name it. His story was that he thought that humanity was killing the Earth and that he was on a mission to eradicate all human life. I've written many notes on these personalities and their possessions. Fun times. Hard to talk about."
"My dad is a pastor. He started a church, and during the one service, while we were doing worship, a guy started acting strange and rolling his eyes back, pretty normal 'possessed' stuff. All the pastors took the kids out of the main hall so we wouldn't be 'attacked.' My parents claim he started throwing the pastors around the room. Then, after my dad commanded the demon to come out, he threw up some green stuff on the floor and couldn't remember anything. I'm not sure how much of this story I really believe."
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"My sister went through a sort of 'possession,' but I think it stemmed more from trauma over our parents getting divorced and was just some roundabout form of coping. She saw demons in mirrors, had auditory hallucinations, and even acted like a demon. My mother called down our pastors from our church, and I mostly just tried to stay uninvolved through the process. She went to a mental hospital for a few weeks and came back really meek. She became religious and stayed attached to my mom for a while. She's not as religious now, but certainly still likes her some Jesus."
"Well, I wouldn't say I was possessed, but I did have a bad energy following me around in the form of a face when I was about 10. I would go through fits of rage over nothing, and I mean nothing. I would be sitting there, and all of a sudden, I would see this face and get super angry and beat on anyone near me. My mom started taking me to this spiritual lady who could read different types of energy. She told my mom, who would eventually tell me, that there was a dark evil energy following me around, and that when I saw it, I would have to spray this stuff around me, and it eventually worked, but yeah. I don't know if that would count as possessed."
"One of my aunts would get INCREDIBLY angry/out of control at random times. She had 10 times my strength. It took four people to pin her down. My grandmother, a rather traditional Moroccan woman, was convinced she was possessed. A few months later, when it was getting way too difficult for us to handle her, my uncle contacted a good friend in Morocco with an 'exorcist' in his family. The exorcist believed she was possessed by a demon, commonly known in Muslim culture as 'jinn' or 'djinn.' We met this exorcist. He asked us to bring sheep guts to him for the exorcism."
"There was a weird episode in my village. I am from India, a rural village, in a backward state. It is near China and mostly jungle. My uncle once heard an owl hooting near our house one night. Since we consider owls hooting a bad omen, my uncle took his gun and tried to shoot the owl down. He pointed his flashlight towards the sound and saw the owl, but it flew away as soon as he aimed his gun. Now, it so happened that after a week or so, we got the news that someone in the village had been possessed. Being one of the elders, my uncle had to see what was happening, and I tagged along with him. He went there to check on the possessed person. The person was writhing and twisting when my uncle arrived, but as soon as he saw my uncle, he jumped up. He started pointing at my uncle and saying he's not good. When asked why, he said he tried visiting my uncle as an owl, but my uncle wanted to shoot him, so he flew away."
"In college, I took an anthropology class called 'Magic, Ritual and Religion.' We watched a video of what was supposedly an authentic exorcism. If I remember correctly, it was actually a segment from a news program or something like that. At any rate, it was embarrassingly obvious that the 'possessed' girl was faking it. All the religious nuts around her totally believed it, though. And please understand, I am calling those specific people religious nuts, I'm not saying all religious people are nuts. I tend to accept that there are things out there we may not understand or can't yet explain, but that particular exorcism was about as real as Marlena's on Days of Our Lives."
"My wife delivered a baby in 2004, and I was re-told this story when she returned home. During this delivery, her patient (the mother) was possessed. The husband and doula were both present, and a visiting nurse was present. The mother spoke in tongues during the delivery, and her face contorted. The husband started getting worried and approached his wife, and was thrown across the room; he was dazed but conscious. From what I was told, there were many peculiar occurrences during this delivery. Still, the worst of all was that the doula (I'm retelling the story, so I was not a witness, but three people swear to this) was lifted into the air and not by any physical means. The baby was born after she returned, and nothing strange occurred afterwards."
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"I have seen a girl have several demons possessing her at once. She was in a service in Armenia, in the rural town of Bjni, and I remember how that she reacted to the presence of the Holy Spirit in that church. I was 13 years old and sitting in front of the room while she was in the back. At some point, she began screeching in a way I cannot describe well in writing. I thought she was dying. It was a scream unlike anything I had heard, and I have not heard anything remotely close to it since (I am now 21 years old). It took five grown men to hold her while the pastor commanded the demons to leave her. Long story short, yes, demon possession is real. Demons possessed the girl after her mother welcomed demons into their home. I witnessed how the girl was able to overpower several grown men at once. I remember the way she screamed, and I know her story."
"I have performed multiple exorcisms. Maybe 40+? It's hard to keep track. The vast majority of them were on the mission field across Africa. They can be very dramatic to the extent that multiple voices come from someone's mouth, levitating, lights flickering, etc. But in my experience, that was maybe five out of the 40. I've seen my friend's body contort and multiple voices come from his mouth here in the States, so it's not sequestered to just Africa. It was terrifying at first, but the Holy Spirit empowers you in a way I've never experienced otherwise to cast them out without fear. And let me tell you something, every demon falls before the authority of Jesus' name. If anyone has any questions about it, I'm happy to answer!"
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"About 15 years ago, I spent a couple of years as a shaman, which, among other things, required denying the deity of Christ and making contact with 'ancient spirits.' I experienced a possession incident which could have killed me, but instead helped me come to faith in Jesus. I'm grateful today for his saving power and love in my life. I've experienced several other exorcisms in people who became my friends, all unforgettable. I believe the human experience of reality is mainly interpreted by what is believed inside. So people who don't believe in unholy spirits will not see demons (even if they manifest in front of their faces), and people who believe in a spiritual battle will see demons and angels everywhere, even if they may not be present there in that moment."
"I went to a church with my family when I was younger. A pastor from the late '90s was from Egypt, the suburbs of Chicago, and most of the family attended the church. The pastor started doing exorcisms after church and at people's homes. It would start with a deep verbal prayer, almost hypnotic. After a while, whoever was possessed would fall over, and the exorcism would start. The pastor would ask questions like the demon's name and who put the demon in that person. The person would shout and shake their body and legs, and we would hold the person down. They would throw up the demon in the name of Jesus. It was definitely a weird time and caused lots of drama."
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"My husband's mother and his aunt were playing Ouija one day when a spirit got into his aunt. He said his mother called him and his brother, and they couldn't refrain from her. She was trying to take her shirt off and yelling. Her mom called a friend who knew about these things, and she told her to read a Psalm (I don't really remember the number). As soon as she read the psalm, the woman began to calm down."
What are your thoughts on exorcisms? Believer or not? Comment below!
And if you enjoyed this, you'll love the upcoming horror film The Ritual! Based on the real notes and findings of a real-life exorcist and the multiple exorcisms of Emma Schmidt, it's sure to horrify you, and is now playing in theaters. Check out the trailer here: