The burrito test

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If the place you're staying at doesn't let you get up in the middle of the night to microwave a burrito, then you're in an institution:

http://realsocialskills.org/post/648345 ... nstitution

I'm happy to say the room and board my therapist helped me find and I'm staying at DOES pass the burrito test. Though I've never microwaved a burrito there, I have microwaved plenty of other stuff at night.

I think this is really good, and explicates what we understand about our living situation in the first place. I for one would not want to stay in a place that fails the burrito test.

Wow ... my childhood friend is obviously in an institution xD When I first got back in contact with her, we cam chatted once on skype and then they tapped her skype so that she could only contact "family members".

Institutional abuse can be one of the most subtle and difficult to detect forms of abuse. Somebody's liberty should only be deprived if it can be *proven* to be in their best interests... but there's lots of ways that institutions can bend the rules. It's so easier in cases of a power imbalance for the organisation to become suited to what the staff want, rather than the clients. Hell, it often happens without the staff even noticing what they have done.

Tell that to my parents. They got mad at me for microwaving things at night when I was away for university, and repeatedly said I should have never been allowed to do it. Needless to say, they never let me do it at their home. But this is rather pointless—when you’re at someone else’s home, or someone else is paying your living expenses, they have every right to set whatever rules they want to.

My brother is actually going through a similar problem after having moved back home. He is young so naturally he's active and likes to run all over the place while mom and dad are old and relatively quiet and don't like the activity all the time. They said if he's out past mid night then he needs to stay out because if not then mom loses sleep from having to stay up to let him in and then being unable to go to sleep for at least an hour or so afterward. But granted like you said, that's your parents and how they roll. If its other people THEN its probably an institution.

Anyway further more on my childhood friend. I honestly thing the home feared me being an outsider despite the fact that I was as I specified "her childhood friend". I would question stuff up and around the corner and that would wise her up a bit. She probably questioned things and that's why gradually over time she began to talk to me less and less. Another thing they do in these places is that they keep you veeery busy. She was always here and there if it wasn't to grasp meetings then it was to tennis, dances, and other things often organized by the institution that I'd be surprised she even had time to catch a breather. I've heard of group homes yes, for I know of yet another "childhood friend" that was put into one. But nothing compares to that institution that my other childhood friend currently still resides in. For those interested in researching I think its called ARC or if I'm not mistaken.