Going out.

Going out or staying in; either way entertaining requires considerable planning.

If it is someone you want to impress, there can be no weakness. The true performance begins long before you get to the hair, make-up and which frock section. Imagine meeting someone and finding that they don't 'do illness'. It happens.

Very careful preparations. Bridget Jones and her choice of pants had it easy. Tiny or 'suck it all in', a simple choice that would be bliss for women with Arthritis and no doubt a number of men too.

For us, the choice begins early in the day. How much to do (movement, work, walking) without wearing ourselves to a single mille-feuille leaf , transparent, brittle and likely to end up with sauce on our faces?

The second is to time and balance the medication so as to appear as pain free and normal as possible but not high, asleep or lunatic, to be able to dance or move with some ease (and much grace) but not collapse within a few minutes.

Thirdly, if you're going for dinner, will the consumption of food slow down the rate at which the painkillers are absorbed, will sitting for too long leave you bent and mis-shaped, like a rejected Cadbury chocolate when you finally stand up, will you be able to have a glass of wine with all those meds, will refusing wine make you look like a prude?

Oh for the days when I simply wondered if my bum truly was big in that frock.

Will confessing put the mockers on?

Will a confession of 'Arthritis' put me in the 'too old' section? Whereas a nicely judged outfit, a good hair cut, false lashes will subtract years - does 'Arthritis' add them?

If so, we're screwed. We're aged before our time.