Summer Recap & Next Steps Researching Immunology Issues

The summer was amazing!

Last night, on the last day of summer, B and I recapped our summer highlights. We love playing the highlights game.

We had lots of fun weekends. It was my summer of saying yes, and it was easy to do while we were on a break from anything fertility related. I had weekends away, we had some together, we went to baseball games (hello Washing.ton Nat.ionals National League East Champs!), and it all culminated in a trip we planned in May for the last week of August to Ban.ff and Jas.per National Parks in Alberta, Canada!

I've been wanting to go to Ban.ff for so, so long and it was like a dream come true. It exceeded my already high expectations of the place! It was like being overwhelmed by beauty all day long. I'll leave some pics at the end of this post.

In terms of next steps, we've pulled out of our DC clinic that gave us less than a 10% chance and wanted us to move to donor egg. We're in process of moving to RM.A in NJ. They do genetic testing of embryos in their clinic and are one of the best in the country.

In the meantime, though, I'm exploring whether my issue is related to immunology stuff. I met with someone through my support group who had had several losses similar to mine and it turned out that she had these natural killer antibodies and was successful having her baby with IVIG transfusions. There seems to be a lot of controversy about this and I'm not sure my doctors want to look into it, which is why I have another consult with someone in DC who specializes in repeat pregnancy loss and who uncovered this issue with this acquaintance.

I want to make sure we leave no stoned unturned in this process. RMA is not inexpensive and we need to figure out what the problem is. I can't believe that for the last almost 7 years that it's been egg quality when I started ttc'ing when I was 32!

Anyway, here's some peace from my summer...

On the way to Banff from Calgary:

View of Banff Town with Tunnel Mountain in the middle:

Lake Louise in Banff National Park:

Moraine Lake:

Moraine Lake:

Moraine Lake:

More of beautiful Moraine Lake (and yes, we did go canoeing!):

Peyto Lake on the way to Jasper National Park:

Honeymoon Lake close to Jasper:

Waterfall near Jasper:

View of Spirit Island on Maligne Lake in Jasper National Park;

Maligne Canyon:

Maligne Canyon:

Leaving Jasper:

Double rainbow back at Banff, a nice omen to end the trip & summer!