This week on the blog I'm running a Birth Story Special. Yesterday I published Michelle's story , of a planned home birth that ended in an emergency caesarian. Today I have decided to share the story of my own first birth, also a planned home birth, that evolved into a hospital induction and forceps delivery. NICE guidelines state that induction is likely to lead to a labour that is more painful, and more likely to end in epidural, instrumental delivery or caesarian. And yet i n the UK today around 20% of births are induced. Many women find that they are coming under pressure to accept induction from around 40 weeks, and often there are confusing messages regarding the safety of continuing the pregnancy beyond their due date. Of course, there is not a great deal of hard evidence about what happens if women are left to go into labour spontaneously beyond 41 or even 42 weeks, as most women are not 'allowed' or encouraged to get this far. Many wom...