I help out at a street kitchen which feeds the vulnerable, today this guy who I've seen plenty of times, usually seems pretty mild mannered and keeps to himself, starts talking to me about aliens and demons and devils and the bilderburg group and all this shit.
Like you get all this sort of crank conspiracy stuff when dealing with this sort of crowd, so that was par for the course, but then the guy started saying he was a demon (he also referred to it as a Djinn) who had possessed the body I was talking to. He started referring to himself as "we" like fucking Venom. He was irl fedposting about some pretty violent shit.
Eventually I was doing something else and he bailed, but me and the other guy who had been trapped in this conversation were kinda rattled. Usually you just nod along with some conspiracy types, push back a little if you can. But this seemed like a total break with reality. He even told us how "I [as in the demon] started as a voice in his [as in the guy i was actually talking to] head, but now I'm in control". He told us about going to the psych ward so clearly he's not been helped by the system.
Wtf do you do. This dude has always seemed fine but now I'm worried he's gonna play out the last act of the movie Bug at one of our kitchens one day. Like wtf. What the actual fuck. I just want to feed the hungry bruh.
When they are having an episode their delusion seems completely real to them, as if it was a matter of fact. Just focus on their emotions rather than the content of their message. If there is community mental health services in your area, communicate that they will also listen to what they have to say.