Ray Paulley
Psoriatic arthritis

I was in pain. I couldn’t even put my socks on. Now that’s pretty, well, it was bad for me. I’m trying to get my socks on and I can’t bend to do it and it hurts and I’m getting cranky. I’m thinking, here I am, I can’t even put my socks on. And what I do now, I’m a bicycle tourist. I put me tent, my panniers on the back of the bike and I ride. Just got back from Spain, done the Camino de Santiago; 800 kilometres across the top of Spain and that’s a 69 year old bloke with psoriatic arthritis. You can do it but you got to keep yourself fit and take the appropriate medications. And if you do that as an older person or any person you can pretty much do whatever you want to do. But I’ll just stress, it’s all about personal responsibility and looking after yourself and of course getting the appropriate diagnosis from a medical practitioner that you know you can trust and rely upon. I’ve sought that person out and that’s what does it for me.