Can I just ask....

[Hotpinkangel19]

What your 4th births/labours were like? My midwife today said that 3rd births are more difficult generally? I'm 37 +2 with baby no 4 and terrified. X

My fourth was very quick - just a couple of contractions, then a baby. It was the only labour where my waters broke before contractions, so I had about an hour to get ready.

My 4th was the easiest, my first three boys were born with forceps

@Hotpinkangel If you’re anything like me, the worry could be that you don’t think you can be fourth time lucky, which obviously is silly superstition and negativity creeping in. Chances are if you’ve had fairly straight forward previous births then there’s a good chance this one will be too.

There isn't any reason for 3rd or 4th births to be more difficult per se, but it's often harder to know when Labour is starting for real. It's common to get a lot more prelabour. I had several false starts with babies 4 & 5, and have heard similar from other mothers of large families. But they were my easiest births by far.

I worked with midwives for a while and several said that women tend not to go into full labour until older kids are all safely asleep.

Looking at the research on this, there are various risk factors that mothers of large families tend to have (older, higher BMI), but if you are in good health and have a good obstetric history then that is more relevant. No reason to expect your births to be more difficult. First is statistically the most troublesome and that's behind you now!