so what actually happens when your waters break?

[pinkgirlythoughts]

Due date today, and midwife said this morning that she can feel a big pocket of fluid towards the bottom of my uterus. She laughed "somebody's going to get wet feet when these waters go!" So of course I've been panicking all day about what's actually going to happen! Do you get some kind of warning beforehand? Or could I just be standing in the queue at Tesco and it suddenly happens? Argh!!

I was induced a week past due date and my waters broke like the corridor scene in titanic! Whoooooshing great flood! I was more than a little startled :O

DS1 little trickle whilst on hospital bed.

DS2 broke while I was in the hospital loo during visiting hours. I had to shout for assistance. The midwife ended up getting a mop and bucket.

DD Big gush again, during labour

DS3 Bit more complicated, his head wasn't engaged but the force of all the water was making me have contractions. Waters broke at hospital and a smallish gush. Then hours later when labour was well underway, I remember having a huge contraction and telling the midwife that my waters were going to break, she looked at me a bit confused and then it felt like I dropped gallons of water, all of her feet. DS3 arrived about 15 minutes later. The midwife squelched around the ward, we could actually hear it in her shoes!