The number one box office hit in the USA in 2005 was The Exorcism of Emily Rose. Appealing to lovers of the paranormal, the movie portrayed a young girl possessed by demons and entailed her suffering and the many exorcism rites she’d endured to be freed.

The real Emily Rose, Anneliese Michel was a young, beautiful woman on her way to a career in elementary education. She was born on September 21, 1952, in a small village in Bavaria.

At the young age of 17, Anneliese’s life turned into a nightmare. She began having unusual seizures during the night, she’d described the symptoms as paralysis, a enormous weight on her chest, her body becoming rigid and she wouldn’t be able to speak.

Doctors at the Psychiatric Clinic in Wurzburg diagnosed Anneliese as suffering from Grand Mal epileptic seizures. After the occurrence of her third seizure, she spent close to a year in a psychiatric hospital in Mittleberg.

During her stay at the hospital, she started seeing demonic faces, especially during her daily prayers and voices telling her that she was damned.

Doctors there began to medicate her with some type of anticonvulsant. Anneliese’s frustrations grew when the medications didn’t provide any help, she continued to see the faces and became more depressed.