…….old people are always complaining about aches and pains. Well, that’s probably because they have aches and pains!

In the last two or three weeks, I have suddenly started having a pain in my left arm. It makes me think that if I lift my left arm over my head it will hurt – but it doesn’t. It’s when I reach behind me for some reason that the pain is pretty well extraordinary! Pulling up the left side of my trousers, for example. You reach down with both hands to pull them up. That doesn’t hurt. You get them almost to their allotted place and – wham, there’s the pain.

It’s sort of in my shoulder and in the muscle that sits on the top of my upper arm. But also, it’s in the muscle on the underneath of my upper arm and it shoots across from the shoulder to the side of the neck. When I drop my arm, the pain goes away – it’s very sneaky, it lets you forget about it and you go to tie your apron behind your back and – CAUGHT YA’!

So far, I haven’t been to the doctor about it – I’m hoping it just goes away like the ‘trigger thumb’ I wrote about earlier this year. I wore that damned splint for a couple of weeks but it didn’t seem to help much. In the end, I rather forgot about it and when I remembered a few days ago, I found that it had gone! (I wonder when/if it will come back.)

All my life I have been blessed with good skin! It was a little bit oily in my adolescence but I didn’t get spotty – maybe just one or two, once in a while. At the same time, I have always been free of allergies – until I reached middle age.

I used to make jewellery. Not the expensive silver or gold and precious gem stuff – it was brooches and earrings made of resin and hand painted. My sister, Jennie, started the business. She sold her items at Covent Garden. When she was pregnant she thought that resin probably wasn’t something she should be using so offered all her moulds and equipment to me. That was just about the time I gave up teaching so I was pleased to take up her offer.

My making and painting were not as lovely as hers – she was and is an artist! But some of the things I made were attractive and I sold many a Christmas tree brooch and sets of earrings in the weeks before Christmas. And when I made those cute earrings, I would wear them. Then, suddenly, my body shouted, NO! YOU CANT WEAR THIS CHEAP METAL IN YOUR EARLOBES!

So, for a while, I made earrings using only silver ear fixings but even those began to cause itching and redness and I had to give up wearing any earrings. I also had to give up wearing metal watches, metal chains, metal rings. My skin had rebelled! (I can wear gold next to my skin if anyone was interested in buying me a present!)😁

Years passed. I became allergic to plasters as I’ve said before. Then I reached the grand age of 81 and a bit. On my right wrist appeared a weepy, red patch right next to the place where I was going to have my carpal tunnel operated on. When he arrived into the room, I asked the doctor if he knew what it was. He said, “No, but it won’t stop me carrying out the procedure,” and it didn’t. After the 15 minute op, the doctor bandaged the wound (without a plaster!) and covered the whole of my hand and wrist with a crepe bandage. When I removed the bandage, the itchy, red patch had disappeared!

Some weeks later I found out where it went – to a small space behind my right ear! For weeks I thought it would just go away. It didn’t. Then I read that a certain cream could get rid of eczema and, luckily, I had some of that specific cream in my bathroom cupboard so I used just a touch of it. A couple of days later, it was gone…..for a day or two. Then it was back.

When I can get an appointment to see the doctor, I’ll find out what it is and let you know.

We old people don’t complain just to complain. We’re not used to these pains – they’ve crept up on us. I know! You’re telling me I should have exercised more, should have lifted weights and walked and swum and jogged. I did (not the jogging) but I figured when I got to my age I could start being more lazy. I’m here to tell you, I shouldn’t have let myself get lazy! Try to remember this as you age. I bet, though, you’ll forget just as I have forgotten all the good advice I was given growing up and growing old.