anyone had 2nd degree tear, no stiches and given birth again?

[naturalbaby]

With ds1 the midwives suggested stiches but i really wasn't keen so i didn't have any. silly thing to do in hindsight, it healed but not back together if that makes sense. with ds2 a tore a tiny bit more but not enough to need stiches. i'm due in 2 weeks and now really worried about tearing more - there isn't much perineum left to tear! ds2 was a v.fast delivery so i'm expecting the same this time but planning a home birth so am really worried about having to transfer to repair any further tears. i'm sure it will be fine and dc3 won't do much more damage than ds1 did but i was just wondering if anyone else was in a similar position and how they're healing?

I had 2deg tear with DC1, who was back to back, which was initially stitched, however after 3 days the stitches started to fail (apparently batch of faulty stitching material!) and by 7 days had none left. I ended up with an infected perineum too by the end of that first week. In effect ended up unstitched and was left to heal "naturally" for all the 14wks it took!

Like you describe I've healed but not back together correctly. I was also worried about subsequent deliveries as seem to have little left to tear.

13mths later DC2 arrived, fast in comparison to DC1, and all I got was a small 1st deg tear which wasn't stitched. A further 30mths later DC3 was born, in the pool, and all I had was again a very small 1st deg skin tear. Ended up in theatre for different reasons and the dr didn't even want to try and stitch it as it was "only a nick".

To answer in brief, no significant tearing with subsequent deliveries but neither of them where back to back like the first.

With hindsight I do wonder what my perineum used to look like, I never thought to check pre kids! Now I know it's a scrappy mess :o