Steve Easton a 51-year-old man living in Camberley, Surrey, suffered for years from a strange allergy that led him to always have a stuffy nose and repeated headaches.
That was until one day, when he sat at his desk and sneezed and finally began to breathe freely and feel better as he expelled part of a toy dart that had been stuck in his nostril for more than 40 years.
Easton told his parents and discovered to their amazement that at the age of seven he had been taken to hospital after thinking he had inhaled the very piece of a suction cup dart.
His mother and father had found little Steve playing with his dart gun in their home and noticed that one of the rubber tips was missing. The doctors, however, after checking him and finding nothing, thought it was a mistake.
Fortunately, despite the long time spent in his nasal cavity and apart from constant colds, the suction cup did not cause him any other health problems.