Friday Confessional & Forum: Pregnancy edition

I confess that my husband and I spent nearly an hour this morning watching Veggie Tales videos on YouTube. Oh, and our toddler watched with us. All because I woke up with this song stuck in my head, thanks to the monkey books my son loves and weird pregnancy dreams:


I confess that rather than having reached that "done" point of pregnancy, I'm kind of freaking out the other way. I have a HUGE project list that I want to finish before this little one comes and it's starting to stress me out that it won't happen. Just not enough for me to really kick it into gear and get working on the list. :)

I confess that I always (you know, the twice that I've been through it) have a hard time dealing with the transition that is labor and delivery: the transition from being pregnant to actually living with the baby that I've been planning for so long. I'm happy at point A (being pregnant) and I'm excited for point C (having a new baby... and a toddler) but the point B part (labor and delivery) is hard for me to wrap my want-to-plan head around... so many variables!

I confess that I am a big wimp. I had an epidural with my son, and I'm considering doing this delivery drug-free, but I'm afraid that I'm too much of a wimp. (Not that an epidural in any way makes you a wimp. I just am a wimp who also had and loved my epidural :)

I confess that the thing that makes me feel wimpy is just two little words: back labor. I had no problem with the regular contractions with my son, but I had HARD contractions through my back that just made me want to stab someone in the eye. Repeatedly. So, back to the wimp thing: I'm afraid I'm too wimpy to work through those contractions in my back to do the drug-free delivery. But I'm not really committed either way yet.

I confess that I want to hear your birth stories! (This is the forum part :)

Now, I don't need ALL the nitty gritty details (because I'm trying to reduce some anxiety here instead of add to it...) The cliff notes version will suffice. Induced? Natural? Epidural? Best thing? Worst thing? 

I have 5-ish weeks to either toughen up and decide I'm going drug free or just embrace the fact that I like to avoid pain (and also that thanks to the epidural, I slept through most of my last labor...) So lend me your two cents, especially any insight you have about second and beyond labor and delivery (are they really shorter?), back labor, pain management, etc...please?