School life was never much fun, I had few friends at school and was a little bit too reserved. In secondary school, this led to direct bullying by my peers which was compounded when I hit one back and blacked out with rage. All I can remember is hitting the boy and then finding myself trying to scale a tall fence with four prefects dangling from my legs and the overwhelming desire to punch the boy down again and jump on his head repeatedly. The boy was between two prefects on the opposite side of the fence. To this day I have no idea how much time elapsed between the two events. My response was to bury all forms of anger deep in my subconscious for fear of that happening again.

This led me to being bullied on a wider scale and I quickly fell into a pattern of rejection and depression and left me open to further attacks. I became quite emotionally disturbed inside, but I was able to hide it from those around me. I think they put it down to my being a teenager or laziness. My schooling dropped dramatically as a result and I left school with no qualifications worth mentioning.

I remember leaving the school gates, telling myself that no-one would ever pick on me again. My heart was filled with deep seated anger and torment. I was confused and felt completely weak. During my early teens I had started to attend church and had made a decision to follow God because there was no-one else I could trust. This decision was tested when I felt challenged to go on a six month course with an international evangelistic organisation. Three or four months would have been spent in training and then we would have gone to Spain for the World cup. Instead I moved back to Eastleigh and swept a factory floor.

This decision took me away from church and into pubs and discos. I quickly descended into drinking very heavily until a friend of mine got a job in a pub. He revealed to me how much I was drinking which was 7-10 pints of beer followed by half a bottle of spirits. This revelation scared me away from drinking spirits but my beer drinking increased to more than 15 pints a night for some time afterwards.

Eventually I got into a bad relationship with a woman that turned very sour. Further embittered I left Eastleigh and returned to live with my parents again. By this time they had moved from the New Forest. I finally reached the point where I felt God's presence move away from me. I had not been aware of his presence until he moved away from me, but at the time, I Thought God had finished with me and that I fully deserved to go to hell.

I decided, all that was left for me was money, sex and power. I took a hard look at myself and realised the only way I could get all three was through the occult. Within a week of deciding that, I was approached by a friend who was part of a local coven willing to train me as a white warlock (male witch). I began my training and within a month something happened which made me realise that Jesus had not given me up as I had thought.

For a couple of days I did not know what to do. Then one afternoon at work I physically felt God's presence. There was no booming voice or audible words, just the instinctive knowledge that God was speaking to me and that He was giving me a choice. Either I could continue without Him and become a powerful witch (this felt like a promise) or I could turn away from the occult and follow Him in the way of truth. There were absolutely no promises except Heaven if I chose to follow Him. I also sensed that if I refused Him then I would not get another chance to do so. It was a no brainier for me. I jumped at the chance of returning to Him.

I quickly informed my 'friend' of my decision and found myself receiving all kinds of threats from him. Eventually the coven got together and focussed a curse upon me which was intended to kill me. The effect on me was a powerful headache which no painkillers could touch. I was admitted to hospital where they gave me some of their strongest pain killers but without any effect. A girl from the church I had returned to, heard about my headache and was prompted to stand beside my bed in the ward and pray in tongues (God given language that is not learned). As she stood beside my bed, she was so radiant all I could do was stare at her. As I stared and she prayed, the pain slowly melted away. It was one of the most beautiful moments of my life. A few months later I met my former 'friend' in Salisbury market. He turned white the moment he saw me, blurted out that he thought I was dead, made an excuse to leave and practically ran from my presence.

Since that time (and over many years) I have received healing for the emotional wounds from my youth, been freed from addiction to tobacco, released from heavy drinking and even had a demon cast out of me. Demons are real and I remember the first time I felt the thing move inside me. I suddenly realised that the pleasure and excitement I felt from the porn I was addicted to was no longer my own. I became aware of an entity jumping up and down within me excitedly. I realised it was demonic and began to fight it. I fell down many times fighting with the demon inside me before I reached the point of true repentance. Only then did God release the help I needed to get free. This came in the form of some godly people who helped me cast it out of myself.

I realise that I have been through stuff that is completely alien to most people. This path has made me aware of the interaction between the spiritual, the emotional and the physical. Some of these things (if not most) may seem unreal to you. You may well think I am some kind of crank. All I can say is that if you knew the hate filled and cowardly liar that I was and me as I am now, you would see too much change to dismiss me as a crank. I now walk by truth, have confidence, a clear mind and inner strength.

God has rescued me from myself and the enemy of my soul. He has freed me from fear, made me strong and given me hope. The life I now lead is so much better than the bitterness and lies that I have left behind me. There can be no turning back for me because I simply have too much to lose. I am healed, forgiven, made whole and freed from many bondages. I am now in a position where God is beginning to use me to reach out to others who are hurting and wrestling with their own bondages. Nothing gives me greater pleasure than helping someone make that next step towards their healing or that final step to complete freedom. As Martin Luther once said "Here I stand, I can do no other".