I tried to keep this brief, but not possible, so please bear with me!
Contractions with dd started at 6am on the Saturday, went in Saturday evening when they were 4 minutes apart, got sent home again. Went back in on Sunday morning, got sent home. Went back in around 11pm on the Sunday begging for some pain relief as the TENS unit pads wouldn't stick (so I just kept getting electrocuted, great fun). By 2pm on the Monday my waters still hadn't broken and I think I was still only 6cm. They broke my waters for me then refused to let me even attempt a water birth as they thought (they weren't sure though) there was SLIGHT staining, so 'the baby must be in distress'. Cue being hooked up to the monitors (her heart rate did not change from that point until she was born. Distress? What distress?!) By 7pm I STILL wasn't even close to 10cm so they gave me an epidural and hooked me up to a drip to induce me. At which point the shifts changed and the midwife (let's call her The Biatch) who came on barely spoke to me, except to call me 'Dear' (which I HATE 
). At one point she even left me on my own (husband had been taken off to be fed, lucky bloody men), stuck in the bed because of the epidural obviously and unable to reach the call button!
From here on I'm a little hazy, but I know it was late into the night when Biatch asked 'Ok, you want to start pushing?' 'Am I finally at 10cm then?' said I. 'What? Oh, er, yeah' was her not-entirely-convincing response. So, pushing began, probably - I had no idea as she gave no coaching or help despite the fact I couldn't feel what I was doing. At one point dh actually yelled at her 'Do you want to actually communicate with my wife and tell her if she's doing anything right?!' By half three ish (Tuesday morning now) though it was finally decided that I wasn't getting anywhere (no shit Sherlock!) so they'd prep me for surgery, the consultant would have a look and use forceps or go for emcs if necessary. Sadly, dd had apparently got stuck and it was emcs or nothing. By this point I was exhausted, had eaten nothing in about 36 hours and had had maybe two hours sleep. DD was (thankfully) fine, but it took me a long time to be able to come to terms with what is, in my head at least, a 70 hour labour. A midwife will not recognise it as such because I never really got into active labour until the Monday afternoon. I had no pain relief at all until the early hours of Monday morning thanks to the completely useless TENS unit, despite having had fairly strong and regular contractions from the word go.
The problem I now have is being pregnant with Child The Second and having to have an idea what to do. Given my family history (mother and grandmother both had to have sections, grandmother definitely had the 'wrong-shaped' pelvis, mum has never been given an official diagnosis), I accept on some level that a section is very likely to be necessary, but at the same time I can't get over the grief the section caused and the feeling of failure as a woman. I tried to explain this to my new midwife and got the stock response of 'Well you and the baby came out healthily so it doesn't matter how it happened'. Well I'M FUCKING SORRY MRS, but it matters TO ME. I cannot tell you how many times I've heard this reply and how fucking sick of it I am. I'm not fine. I still have flashbacks. I'm crying typing this and it was two and a half years ago.
I also can't talk to anyone I know about this as no-one I know has experienced anything approaching this length of labour - even my mother's was an 'easy' 36 hours, and her waters broke of their own accord. My BIL had the gall to say to my face that I had an easy time of it - his wife popped out her first in 3 hours and her second before they'd even had time to fill the birthing pool.
The oddest sensations of all of this though is firstly the guilt that my husband may never get to cut the cord (again, not helped by BIL saying how wonderful it was and how much he'd missed out) and secondly the guilt that my daughter may one day have to go through this.
I probably had a point here somewhere. - hunts down the back of the sofa- Ah, there it is. My question to all those who've managed to read this far is: given these circumstances, would you even attempt a VBAC or would you go for an elcs and save the hassle (and retain some level of control)? Also, how do you make people understand that it IS a big deal and that I certainly did not take the 'easy way out'?