I was going to comment on that, che. I originally read it double spaced in word format. It's very well written and the formatting here just doesn't do it justice. Without spacing between the paragraphs as reference points it's easy for they eye to get lost.
Content wise... There's so much that I can relate to.
I was then told that I would need to start a “confession letter”, which he and my parents would read. I would have to write two pages a day until it was finished, or it was a cat 4 refusal, and I was not allowed to omit anything. When I did not finish two pages for one day, my HOPE buddy was given permission by my therapist to read my handwriting in order to determine if my confession letter was honest, in-depth, and satisfactory for the day.
That's the real essence of disclosures in program. They aren't really looking for the truth. They're looking for trumped up confessions they can use against you. Use against you with your parents, with your peers, to shame you and beat you down, to cut you off, to give you only one way out (the program)... to make you think that maybe you do have a problem when you don't... to pressure until you agree... to pressure you until you believe. It's just class A mindfucking from beginning to end. It's not about helping a person to get better from any legitimate ailment, it's about convincing people they have problems they don't have in order to make money off a lengthy and costly snake oil "cure"... It's about turning a person into a billboard parroting "the program saved my life" without any real thought going on behind it.
What really hurts me about all this shit is that half these kids come away so deeply scarred that even when they *know* there was nothing wrong there's this little phobia... irrational fear... doubt constantly whispering in your ear "you'll fail without us" like a curse. Everything you're told rattles off again and again listening to the radio or watching I. I hear "fake it til you make it" on some song lyric and I can't help thinking about being forced to act like I believed in the bullshit and then slowly starting to believe it and become somebody else transparently. Sure there was a definite breaking point where I really lost it and swallowed the whole program hook line and sinker, but what's far more insidious is the influence I didn't notice until later. The subtle ways they changed kids, distracted by the larger stresses. Incremental compromises.
I suppose out of all of it I've learned to never give an inch of your values under pressure or you'll lose yourself. It's not so much what they take as much as what you don't realize you give until it's too late. I suppose hindsight is 20/20. Grow at your own pace and of your own free will, sure, but not to satisfy others, even if it makes your life easier.