# Know anyone who is "institutionalized"? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [October 21, 2014, 8:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/know-anyone-who-is-institutionalized/702068 "2014-10-21T20:09:02Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![HoneyBadgerDC](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/honeybadgerdc/32/1033_2.png) [@HoneyBadgerDC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HoneyBadgerDC)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2014, 4:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/know-anyone-who-is-institutionalized/702068/21 "2014-10-22T16:39:45Z")
I have known people who spent many years in prison but did not seem institutionalized in the least. I have know others who spent a small fraction of their lives in institutions, drug habs etc. but spread out over many years who seem very institutionalized. My guess is that it has to do with maturity.Some people just need mandated structure to behave or even thrive for that matter. ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2014, 12:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/know-anyone-who-is-institutionalized/702068/22 "2014-10-23T00:55:29Z")
> [@Siam\_Sam](#): > > I’ve told this story before, but it’s been awhile: > > Back in West Texas some good friends lived in an apartment, and we all became friendly with the people next door to them, three members of an extended family. One day, their cousin came to live with them. He was middle-aged and had been in prison in California for almost all of his adult life. He was paroled to Texas because of his relatives there. We’d often share a beer at night, and he was a genuinely nice guy to talk to. Completely open and honest about himself. He’d been given a decent job driving an airport limo, was making good money from that and seemed really to be trying to make a go of it. One quirk that he had, though, was always reminiscing about how good life was in prison. You could see he truly missed the place. He’d tell how you could have anything you wanted there, even pornography and sex. > > About that time, a series of armed robberies began in the area. Yep, you guessed it. During one robbery, the perp ended up shot through the neck but lived. Yes, it was my friends’ paroled neighbor. It seems going back to prison was a main motive for the robberies. They obliged him and sent him back. Another one I remember, although this guy I met only briefly, when I helped a friend move, again back in West Texas. My friend was moving out of this guy’s apartment because he said the guy was “weird.” So weird that he could have moved by himself easily, he had so few possessions, but he wanted someone else present. (The friend had become a roommate by answering an ad the guy had placed on a bulletin board just a few months earlier.) Two or three years later, suddenly there the guy was all over the news. He’d gotten married in the meantime, killed his wife and buried her in the backyard. Being in Thailand, where you can never be sure of other peoples’ history, I’ve probably known quite a few without realizing it. ---
**Author:** ![P-man](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/p-man/32/3606_2.png) [@P-man](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/P-man)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2014, 1:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/know-anyone-who-is-institutionalized/702068/23 "2014-10-23T01:12:27Z")
A guy I was friends with in elementary school turned out to be paranoid schizophrenic. After spending a fair amount of time in jail and mental institution he stabbed his father to death. By high school it was obvious something was wrong. ---
**Author:** ![Urbanredneck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ea5d25/32.png) [@Urbanredneck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Urbanredneck)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2014, 9:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/know-anyone-who-is-institutionalized/702068/24 "2014-10-23T09:42:47Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > A lot of these guys don’t worry about being assaulted or killed because they figure they’re the one who knocks. Ok, sorry but can you please explain “knocks” to me? Is it someone who hurts others? ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2014, 10:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/know-anyone-who-is-institutionalized/702068/25 "2014-10-23T10:18:19Z")
> [@Urbanredneck](#): > > Ok, sorry but can you please explain “knocks” to me? Is it someone who hurts others? Right. They’re the ones who do the assaulting, not the ones being assaulted. ---
**Author:** ![Crafter\_Man](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crafter_man/32/458_2.png) [@Crafter\_Man](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crafter_Man)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2014, 10:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/know-anyone-who-is-institutionalized/702068/26 "2014-10-23T10:58:20Z")
> [@OneCentStamp](#): > > I knew this one guy. He just wanted a Pepsi. And his mom wouldn’t give him one. His parents thought he was on drugs. They were worried he would hurt himself or someone else. [Beat me to it](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LoF_a0-7xVQ). ---
**Author:** ![Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/budget_player_cadet/32/205_2.png) [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Budget_Player_Cadet)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2014, 11:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/know-anyone-who-is-institutionalized/702068/27 "2014-10-23T11:04:11Z")
> [@Urbanredneck](#): > > Ok, sorry but can you please explain “knocks” to me? Is it someone who hurts others? It’s a breaking bad reference. If you haven’t seen it already, look up the “The One Who Knocks” Soliquoy. It’s amazing. Or, you know, just watch the show, because it, too, is amazing. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![don\_t\_ask](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e68b1a/32.png) [@don\_t\_ask](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/don_t_ask)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2014, 11:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/know-anyone-who-is-institutionalized/702068/28 "2014-10-23T11:15:53Z")
When I was psych nursing I saw plenty of people who were institutionalized. However I don’t think that they were so different from the people that are institutionalized in their outside lives. Many of the people I work with are just as incapable of adjusting to changes in their routines. The only difference is the label. Go to work tomorrow and see how many people you can get to swear off TV for a month. ---
**Author:** ![madmonk28](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madmonk28/32/20811_2.png) [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2014, 1:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/know-anyone-who-is-institutionalized/702068/29 "2014-10-23T13:21:13Z")
My sister’s ex-boyfriend is on death row in Virginia for killing the woman he dated after my sis. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2014, 6:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/know-anyone-who-is-institutionalized/702068/30 "2014-10-23T18:42:32Z")
> [@madmonk28](#): > > My sister’s ex-boyfriend is on death row in Virginia for killing the woman he dated after my sis. Yeesh. That has to feel creepy. ---
**Author:** ![madmonk28](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madmonk28/32/20811_2.png) [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2014, 7:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/know-anyone-who-is-institutionalized/702068/31 "2014-10-23T19:17:49Z")
> [@RTFirefly](#): > > Yeesh. That has to feel creepy. When my sister and this guy broke up, he got all kinds of crazy and my brother and me had to monitor him moving out while my sister was out of the house. Later, he threatened my sister. After all that bullshit, she started dating him again. My brother and I told her that next time she was on her own getting him out of her life if she took him back. Fast forward, he threatens my sister a few times when she breaks it off again and then murders the next woman he dates. Up until the murder thing, he was one of the better guys my sister dated. ---
**Author:** ![OneCentStamp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/13edae/32.png) [@OneCentStamp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OneCentStamp)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2014, 8:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/know-anyone-who-is-institutionalized/702068/32 "2014-10-23T20:00:12Z")
> [@madmonk28](#): > > When my sister and this guy broke up, he got all kinds of crazy and my brother and me had to monitor him moving out while my sister was out of the house. Later, he threatened my sister. After all that bullshit, she started dating him again. My brother and I told her that next time she was on her own getting him out of her life if she took him back. > > Fast forward, he threatens my sister a few times when she breaks it off again and then murders the next woman he dates. **Up until the murder thing, he was one of the better guys my sister dated.** (emphasis mine) The whole quoted post is gold, but that last sentence is one of the more dryly humorous things I’ve read on the Dope in a while. 😛 ---
**Author:** ![madmonk28](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madmonk28/32/20811_2.png) [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2014, 9:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/know-anyone-who-is-institutionalized/702068/33 "2014-10-23T21:29:46Z")
Thanks, although I appear to have told a lie. I just checked a list of Virginians on death row and he’s not on it, but he did go to prison for murder and my sister told me he got the death penalty, but apparently not. She better not give him another chance… [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/know-anyone-who-is-institutionalized/702068.md?page=1)