Cassidy Reed Yingling is here!

He's here! He's here!

Cassidy Reed Yingling was born on Thursday, February 26, 2009 at 11:50 am. He was 20 1/2 inches long and weighed 7 lbs. 9 oz. He is the spitting image of his daddy...with his momma's nose, lips, and hair. He is a sweet, sweet boy.

Here's the story...in a nutshell. On Wednesday, February 25, 2009 Aldret Elizabeth Crosby was born. After work I went by the hospital to meet her and see Amy. While I was driving I noticed that I was having stronger contractions than normal. They were about 15-20 minutes apart at that point. I met Aldret, got a haircut, and went to Mom and Dad's for dinner. I had to leave their house quickly, though, because I didn't feel good--the contractions were getting pretty strong but not closer together. I got in the bed and was obsessing over the clock. My contractions were about 8-10 minutes apart by about 9:00. I finally fell asleep until about 1:00. I woke up to really strong contractions about 5-6 minutes apart. I called the doctor, and she told me to stay at home as long as I could because I'd be more comfortable. So, I took a shower and wasted about an hour. At 3:00 I woke Andy up, and we headed to the hospital.

When we got to the hospital, I was only 1 1/2 cm! They wouldn't even admit me to the hospital! I had to wait until I was 3 cm. I walked down to Amy's room at 4:00 (on the advice of the nurse). At 5:30, I was back in my room asking for pain medicine. The nurse hooked me up to the monitors, and once she saw my contractions she didn't question my pain rating of a 9. I got hooked up to some pain medicine through an IV at 6:30...FINALLY! I went from 1 1/2 cm to 5 1/2 cm in about an hour. The nurse ordered my epidural at 8:00. While we were waiting for it to get there, I got to 7 1/2 cm and my water broke. The nurse told me that we might have had to "abort the epidural" because we were so close. Needless to say, we did not abort the epidural...and I felt like a new person after that! After about 45 minutes of pushing, Cassidy was here.

I fell in love when they put him on my chest. He is absolutely adorable and sweet and good. I cannot imagine my life without him. We are enjoying every minute of our time with him. Andy is an amazing daddy--so attentive, helpful, and loving. We're a really good team.

Cassidy doesn't know how lucky he is.