Someone would tell me, right?

I used to work in a social work office in a day centre, and I remember one of my social workers had a rather worrying paranoia. She asked me once:

'Well, how do I know I'm really a social worker? What if I'm just convinced I'm a social worker, and that's why they've put me in this day centre? How do I know this office isn't just a special treatment room?'

What can you say to that one? My response was 'Don't worry, of course you're a social worker. And I'm your secretary. Um.'

We had a saying over there too, which was 'It's never too early in the morning for an existential crisis.' And it's certainly true that you get some fairly unusual people working as health professionals.

But that leads me to my scary thought: whenever I tell people about that at work, they laugh, and then grimace. We all have that problem- how would we actually know? I've always accepted that I'm slightly manic and prone to the occasional delusion, but I'm certainly not the only one.

The best test you can do if you're a bit like that is to ask- am I going mad? If the answer's 'possibly' then you're ok for now. One of the major tests in a mental health act assessment is that of insight, so if you're a bit mad and you answer 'no', the odds are you've lost it.

The problem is, there's such a stigma to being a bit, well, waiting for a message from the mothership. But it's really not that bad, most of the happiest people I know are slightly deluded, and it often seems the only way to have fun any more. Which is why I tend to surround myself with fellow crazies, and convince them that they just don't need to pretend any more!

As Seal said 'We ain't never going to survive/unless/we get a little crazy.' So if you're mad, be mad, but be happy.

Another good test to see if you've lost it is to say 'I'm going home'. If the person/people you're with nod and say 'See ya', you're OK. If they respond with 'Now John, we have discussed this, and we agreed it's not really a good idea right now', you've probably lost it.

Just so you know...