20 weeks and counting

So, after a year of trying, losing and failing, I'm finally pregnant (again). This time it appears as though the baby is healthy and without issues and may actually make it full term. This excites me to no end. It's been a long and agonizing 20 weeks.
In the past, we were so anxious to tell family and then waited only through the first trimester to tell friends when we got pregnant. Then a little over a year ago I got pregnant and something just felt wrong. I told the Dr but he blew it off. They couldn't get a strong heartbeat but blamed it on the instruments, never saw things quite right and, again, blamed it on the machines. Then a couple days short of 20 weeks I started to spot and bleed and went to the ER to discover that our baby no longer had any heartbeat and my body was passing it out. After 3 ultrasounds by 3 different Dr's, we opted to speed things up with medication and I gave birth to a tiny, perfect but still born baby boy early in the morning on August 23, 2009. It was devistating-something I never thought I would ever have to go through. We grieved and cried but knew at the same time that it was the way things were supposed to be. We weren't meant to raise Kyle on this earth.
We moved on and decided to try again. By 6 weeks later when I went back for my follow up check (yes, they do those even when your baby wasn't born living) I was pregnant again. After a couple more ultrasounds where we saw our baby and a strong heartbeat, we decided to tell family-we were excited to be able to move on so quickly. Then, in mid-December, I started to bleed again. 11 weeks is pretty normal for miscarriage so this time nobody was concerned, except us. We wanted more answers and were concerned, knowing that we had one more little spirit that has been overly anxious to join our family for years and hoping it wouldn't take more of this loss to get her here.
We moved in January from Australia to the US and transitioned from military to civilian shortly after so we deceded to wait a little before trying again. April seemed like a good time for that but my cycle came and went with no luck. We moved again in mid-April from Arizona to Colorado and were in a hotel while we looked for a house. By early May we had a positive pregnancy test but didn't dare celebrate too soon. We moved into our new house the end of May and started getting settled. The first trimester came and went and our new insurance became effective. Insurance cards finally arrived in July and I decided maybe I should make an appointment. Josh took a couple more weeks to get me the info on Dr's we were allowed to use but I wasn't in a hurry.
See, in the military, they paid for everything without the need for a co-pay, as long as you used the military Dr's, and it was wonderful. Now we have insurance where co-pays are required and there are yearly deductables to be met and I wasn't anxious to start paying those things only to lose another baby. At 15 weeks I got the Dr info and at 16 weeks I finally made an appointment. At 18 weeks I met my new Dr and got to see my baby on ultrasound for the first time to date the pregnancy. I almost expected to see nothing in there when they started up the ultrasound but lo and behold, there was a baby. Beautifull and perfect. It had all it's fingers and toes and a strong beating heart and it was active and moving all the time. It's a little miracle!
We finally told my Mom and Dad we were expecting at a little over 17 weeks and then my in-laws at about 18-19 weeks (my mom would have had to wait too but she's a spoiler). Three days ago we had the anatomy ultrasound-the baby was still there, still wiggling (which I knew, cause I feel it all the time) and still with a strong heartbeat. And now we know that IT"S A GIRL!!!
She has all of her organs and they are where they should be, there's no sign of down's syndrom or any other defects, all blood tests have come back fine-including the genetic ones (cause I'm 35 now and they want to test everything), and, most importantly, she's growing and developing right on track. And now we're here and telling the world how excited we are to be having one more baby and our last (both a happy and sad thing all at once). My persistent little spirit, who wanted so badly not to be forgotten, can now have her physical body and join our family and I'm ever so greatful to be able to have her.

See, she's waving hello to all of you!