Demons = Dreams, Drugs, and Depression.
Dreams: Because the human memory gets a LOT of things wrong (video tape a person experiencing an event, and then quiz them on it.. and watch how many details are distorted). Over time, humans can confuse first-hand reality with dreams, fantasies, and stories they've heard second-hand.
Drugs: Often dismissed by the teller with "But I wasn't taking drugs when the event occured."
Depression: Depression and other mental illnesses can cause all sorts of vivid non-real experiences. Often these experiences can be 'embraced' by the person who experienced them as an opportunity to get some social attention, or to re-enforce a feeling of being 'attacked'. The story becomes exaggerated and over time, even the teller can convince themselves that events really happened as they have exaggerated it.
Just remember: just because you think you see or hear something does not make it real. One of the things that makes humans so capable - our vivid imaginations and ability to process visual information - can have the perverse effect "teetering" between perceiving reality as well as non-reality.
To answer the original poster's question: Perhaps the reason you no longer feel 'attacked by demons' is that you've taken a mental stand "apart" from a particular fantasy. Your brain may be extropolating that desire to discount other fantasy notions as well.
- Lime
