Fellow Pouchers,
I have been scarce on the site and I apologize. Seems like I come around in spurts anymore, but I miss the discussion and camaraderie for sure. Of course, I'm happy to say the scarcity mainly means that my daughter and I are doing well with our pouches and have little reason to be "takers" here. I know, of course, there is still a lot to "give" and I will try to frequent the site more often 
I wanted to post this week because this year is my 10-year j-pouch anniversary and my daughter's 5-year j-pouch anniversary. Milestones are good, and hopefully are encouraging. She is 12 (almost 13) now, and I am, well... older than that. We agreed this past week that we are going to set February 3rd as our celebratory date, even though she got her pouch on Feb. 9th, and I got mine in July (sub-total colectomy on Feb. 15th, j-pouch creation in July).
Actually (and amazingly) February 3rd, 5 years to the day, she and I were admitted to the hospital, only to eventually leave without a colon. So we figured Feb. 3rd was the amazing day we had in common and that we could use for our celebration!
We plan to make a "special" cake 
for the celebration. I will make sure and post it here for you all to enjoy.
Steve
