Dealing with Death as an Atheist

[AFTT47]

I guess I'm a minority among atheists in that death bothers me - a lot. I don't remotely buy into the platitude that death gives life meaning. I believe involuntary death sucks - big time.

But didn't you de-convert later in life?  Not hard to see how immortality would be hard to give up if you've been banking on it half your life.

No, I was no more than 12 before becoming a full atheist. I did have a rich imagination regarding aliens visiting Earth in UFOs and building the pyramids but that was gone before I was 20. I did have hope at that age that we could defeat death within my lifetime and that lasted into my early 30s before it became obvious that it was too early for that.