The Gentlemen's Club.

Once upon a time I thought that arrogance was a virtue. I am after all one of Thatcher's children and I went to Cambridge. Once upon a time I thought it was essential that I joined a Gentlemen's Club. As a Cambridge graduate and public school boy I'm entitled to join 2 different such clubs, the Oxford and Cambridge Club and the East India Club. Then my life came crashing down and after years of fighting to recover those amibtions and so called virtues were irrelevant to me. When my mood is too high I'm always right, I'm annoying, quick witted, judgmental and generally not nice to be around. I try to curb that.

Today as a veteran of mental illness and being practitioner I hope that I know something about it. Perhaps that is my delusion. But what people do know where I work is if the shit hits the fan I do not panic. I rarely ask for help as the response I get can be good or bad. I would rather manage my life as I can control. I give my advice, and history tells me I'm rarely wrong, and people can choose to take it or ignore it. If I pass the buck it is always with the proviso that I gave my advice-if someone chooses to fuck it up then they can take the rap if it goes wrong.

During my journey across Hertfordshire for the last 6 years I have been a character who speaks out and is as a result revered, reviled, or dismissed depending on who comes across me. Those who have met me respect my judegment. Those who do not dismiss me. I am after all not in the club; I am neither nurse, nor social worker, nor Doctor.

10 days ago when a student I know well went tits up I called for help. Everything I predicted has happened and why of earth she is not in hospital I have no idea. Today I was told that she was just playing games as she is personality disordered. Case closed, life over.

Well for those in the know PDs have some of the highest mortality rates of any group in mental health. Long ago I put forward what I called The Right Illness Theory. In short it says the treatment received is directly proportional to the label attached. Translation if you have psychosis or bipolar we might take you seriously. If you have PD we don't give a fuck. As my manager said today if someone is in danger who cares what the label is?

I am dismissed because I'm not in their club. Oh how that might change in the unlikely event that I'm elected to the Board of Governors.

Talking of unlikely events, tomorrow is the Vice-Chancellor's Awards ceremony. It is an excuse to get my linen suit out but I will not win. I'm just not important enough. So for now I stick to the fine Burmese curry that is bubbling away on my hob and the fact that most of the time I make good decisions. I cannot account for the decisions made by others

See you soon.

I Heard a Voice.