Hello! Tomorrow I will be 39 weeks pregnant with my 3rd baby in 3 years....yay!! My midwife offered an induction for early next week, but I really wanted to do a natural labor process, but wanted to kinda talk through it and see others opinions.

I was induced with both my previous children at exactly 40 weeks. With my first, my water broke at 39 + 6 but I never got contractions so they gave me pitocin. With my second, there was reduced fetal movement so my OB wanted to do an induction since I was full term. With both those pregnancies, I never experienced any early labor symptoms. This pregnancy, baby dropped WEEKS ago, I started dilating (only 1cm, but that’s better than my previous pregnancies) and am effaced and very soft, I have CONSTANT pelvic pressure and lightening crotch (CONSTANT), I’ve lost my mucus plug 6 days ago, I had a membrane sweep yesterday, and I’ve actually felt inconsistent contractions (which I never experienced before). I know baby will come when baby wants to come, but I’m wondering if these symptoms mean I may be able to have a natural labor opposed to needing to be induced.

My biggest obstacle right now is that we just moved to a new city and only know 2 other families and none of our out of state family can visit due to Covid, obviously. One family here is very busy and have crazy work schedules, so it’s hard to rely on them if I need a babysitter when I deliver. The other family is going away for Labor Day weekend....they leave on my due date and will be gone for 4 days. So I have no child care confirmed for my other two children if I go past 40 weeks. This is making me feel like I need to be induced to be sure my husband can be at the delivery, instead of watching my other kids. But that’s not the path I want to take.

So, based on this situation, what would you recommend? Hope for natural labor before our child care goes out of town? Or go through with the induction on Monday? I was really hoping that due to my constant discomfort and symptoms right now, maybe things would happen this weekend, but I’m just feeling so stressed.