1. I'm not very flexible without stretching, no. In fact quite the opposite. Until about 6 months ago, I could barely reach down to the height of my ankles, let alone my toes (with straight leg). I started to spend an hour a day doing general stretches to try and help my left knee problem, and now I can nearly get my palms flat on the floor. But yes, I'm not naturally very flexible.

I am not of those descents either, I'm white but not the freckly type, but as far as I know I'm English going back many generations (hope that doesn't put you off as an Aussie ).

The feeling in my right shoulder alters from a "dull constant pain" as if it is made of stone, to a sharper "fresh" tension feeling. The dull feeling tends to be when I wake up in the morning, whereas it gets to a more "traditional" feeling of tension as the day goes on. I do get some tingling in the right side of my face and neck (very slight), as if almost like an echo of the feeling in my traps. The first symptoms of this pain were when I was playing a PC computer game for long periods when 17 (I was doing no activity at the time because my chiropractor had made me afraid to do anything).

The pain in my hip/right leg varies also. Most of the time the hip area just feels "heavy", like when I try and step forward with my right leg, it feels like the muscles in my side have to lift the whole hip up, rather than the right leg just being able to raise forwards in a relaxed manner, like it does in my left leg. I do get a shooting pain in my right leg, but usually only after walking a lot the day before. I must stress I haven't had these symptoms (at least noticeably) for a few years until recently. When I saw my physio at the time about it, he said I had a glute weakness and that the glutes weren't firing, and the exercises he gave me seemed to "cure" it.

I really appreciate your reply, and I know it is pretty dangerous to make suggestions without a proper assessment. But at the moment I just don't know what direction to take. When I go to my GP they don't take me seriously because they think I am just being a perfectionist. But I still feel that there hasn't been enough investigation from people with the right expertise. I know when people get older things start to break down, but I'm only 22, the last 5 years have devastated my social life and had a big impact on my mental health, and if there is anything I can do now to get as close to perfect health as possible I want to do it, so at least I can have a shot at preventing some of those degenerative problems from happening when I'm older.