I was planning (with Alex) to have a natural birth, hopefully just gas, and at my local hospital.

I certainly wasn't planning on being in Melbourne (200kms from home) and in hospital from 31 weeks, not being allowed to walk ANYWHERE except to the bathroom etc etc.

I'm glad I was at least asked whether or not I wanted to try natural birth, they said with my BP they gave me a 90% chance of a c/s, but at least I got to try. And they knew heaps about how Alex was going to be, in terms of health, because he'd had HEAPS of u/s and ctg monitoring beforehand. His heartrate dropped dramatically after the first contraction, and he was born 55 mins later by emergency c/s.

Which was at least "expected" IYKWIM!

I was very lucky, I had a lot of information about my choices (Monash hospital is FANTASTIC) and was always made aware of what was happening, both to me and to Alex. I am also lucky in that my brother is a doctor at Monash and my DH was a nurse at Monash! I guess I got "star treatment"!