Forgetfulness is not always a bad thing!

I had a great laugh last night!!  I realized just before going to bed that I had celebrated the first day of Spring with my kids (celebrating as in just acknowledging and being excited) yet I COMPLETELY forgot to acknowledge my 13th month mark!!  I had actually blogged that day with some before and after pictures - yet did not mention it was my 13th month anniversary of TSW - because I completely forgot - it did not even cross my mind until last night.  I had marked each month of TSW as if they were huge milestones - and they were!  But obviously with feeling so good, this truly shows I am not thinking about my skin anymore on a regular basis.  It is no longer the focus of my life - not even close.  It is now pretty close to the bottom of any importance.  And that my friends is a truly wonderful feeling!  Forgetting my 13th month mark is a blessing in disguise!  It shows me that I wasn't just talking about moving on, I actually have moved on!  When you get to this point, the healing is truly right around the corner.  I may have really dry hands and ankles still, but the TSW itself I think is nearly burnt out.  I will consider myself fully healed when I no longer have to do anything special for my skin.  Currently I am tanning to keep the itching away.  Once I am able to go a month without tanning and my itching is gone and I have no more mini-flares then I will consider myself healed. 

I was just thinking about all the people that suffer with a bad flare somewhere between months 11 and 13.  There seems to be some patterns with TSW...one of those is the "dreaded" 11th month, 12th month, or 13th month flare.  There is also the 9th and 15th month flares.   I have had none of them so far.  I will celebrate much more when I hit my 14th month mark...that will be 6 months without any major flares.  I will also celebrate a 3 month no more mini-flare mark.  I have to go back in my blog to see when I had my last mini-flare.  Honestly I can't remember.  (Another good thing to forget!). 

And before I forget - just wanted to mention we now have 6 people tested for the MTHFR gene mutation with 6 positive results.  I plan to contact the NEA again soon about this.  Hopefully more can be done to look into this factor.