I had my little boy on Sunday night.. My waters had gone sun 2am, I had to go in to be checked and was told my cervix was still posterior and only 1cm dilated- but baby's head was so low it was blocking the cervix from moving...(which was fine because contractions hadn't started!) I came home but returned to hospital with painful but irregular contractions (with my daughter my contractions never got into any pattern-something I made very clear to the midwife on Sunday!) I was told they wouldn't check me because they were irregular 'which means your cervix won't be changing yet' I decided to go for a walk, came back and asked for pain relief, they refused and said I could only have paracetamol or codeine (which I am allergic too and was written on my big red bracelet!) they told me to go to the ward to 'get some sleep' told me it was hours away. I was feeling so frustrated as my DD labour was only 4hours start to finish, so to be told I wasnt even in established labour 'because the toco metre shows irregular contractions' was really disheartening! I said my hubby could go home n my sis in law came up... She asked again if they could examine me because she could see they were strong and long (she's had 4 herself!) and again they said no, and no I couldn't have pain relief because I wasn't in ' established labour! ' at this point I texted my husband told him to come back, when he arrived my sis in law told the midwife to examine me, I raised my voice to midwife abd said 'this is my second labour, I told you already I didn't get regular contractions last time, I Just want my gas and air n water pool for pain relief!' She reluctantly agreed to examine me to find surprise surprise I was 7-8cm dilated! They whipped me into a wheelchair n took me downstairs to L&D and 3 hours later my son arrived! And also came out back to back! All that time they made me think I was being a wimp because I was '1cm' but turns out I was almost there with a back to back baby!! So moral of my story! STICK TI YOUR GUNS, not all labours are 'textbook'