Sorry, but I cannot disagree more with this advice.  Laboring in water can provide some mild pain relief, sure, and some women like it, and it's fine to do. Delivering in water provides zero medical benefit--the 2009 Cochrane Review found that delivering in water made no difference in the incidence of tearing--and can be dangerous if not deadly for the baby, which is why most hospitals will not allow you to deliver in water.  (Risks include:  "higher risk of maternal and neonatal infections, particularly with ruptured membranes; difficulties in neonatal thermoregulation; umbilical cord avulsion and umbilical cord rupture while the newborn infant is lifted or maneuvered through and from the underwater pool at delivery, which leads to serious hemorrhage and shock; respiratory distress and hyponatremia that results from tub-water aspiration [drowning or near drowning]; and seizures and perinatal asphyxia." [The American Academy of Pediatrics’ Committee on Fetus and Newborn in conjunction with the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists.]) If you don't want an episiotomy--which is no longer the standard of care anyway; episiotomies are discouraged--then just refuse it, don't try to somehow "trick" the doctor into not performing one. Water births also preclude the use of an epidural and the use of fetal monitoring that can save babies' lives. I don't mean to start an argument with you; I'm glad you were happy with your two water births and know there are other women who were and are, as well.  And many women like laboring in water, which is fine. But that doesn't make delivering in water beneficial and it definitely doesn't make it safe (which, again, it is not).