Just introducing myself

Hi Everyone - I've been lurking on this board for awhile, but figured I should say hi!  I'm currently pregnant with baby #3 due mid June.  DD#1 was born vaginally after being induced 10 days overdue - because i was stuck in bed on constant monitoring and pit, I ended up getting an epidural and then labor proceeded SO quickly that I had absolutely no sensation (not even pressure) when DD was born so I felt completely disconnected.  After that, I really thought I'd try to go without an epidural for DD#2 so that I wasn't so disconnected from everything.  Little did I know there were other issues that would arise!

DD#2 was born just over a week overdue. I was not induced although the doctor want to schedule me for an induction.  I managed to talk him into allowing me to go to a full 2 weeks overdue before being induced.  #2's birth was eventful because shortly after arriving at the hospital and being put on monitors, they couldn't find my daughter's heartbeat.  They decided to break my water so that they could put an internal monitor on her and when they did that, they discovered meconium in the fluid and that her heartrate was WAY too low and staying there.   Within minutes I was back in the OR being put under general anesthesia while DH stood out in the waiting room and our daughter was born via c-section.  Because she had been affected by the general, she was not responsive immediately (which actually was a good thing long term because she never had a chance to aspirate the meconium).  I woke up about 3 hours later in major pain which took them over 2 more hours to manage because the pharmacy was operating on skeleton staff due to an ice storm and no one could release the drugs I needed.  The entire first day with DD is a haze which I don't really remember and definitely was not the birth I was expecting with her.  That being said, I dont regret how things happened - Turns out she had a prolapsed cord and with the rate my labor was progressing, had I chosen to stay at home longer like the nurse initially advised, my daughter probably would not be here today.  

 All that being said, I'm now hoping for a VBAC with baby #3 as I do not want to deal with the recovery of a c-section while also caring for 2 other children who will be almost 4 & 2.5 while my husband is deployed.  Luckily, we are currently stationed in the UK and the approach here is very midwife & limited medical intervention friendly.  In fact, when I went for my 12 week scan, the sonographer  looked at my chart and said "oh good, I see you already want a VBAC.  We won't have to talk you into it then!" I'm hoping things go smoothly and that a VBAC can happen, but if not, then I'll just hope for a slightly less emergent/traumatic c-section!