Hi all, I resurrected this while scanning through my old posts today as I wanted to give a belated update. I ended up having a wonderful, easy, 4 hour homebirth, with no assistance at all, and smiled the whole way through it! I read Ina May's guide to childbirth and the Hypnobirth book and have a wonderful midwife who did home visits and helped me educate myself and train my mind to be able to stay calm :-) I now have a wonderful 2 year old daughter to show for it :-)