Braxton Hicks or Labour

[WendyWillow]

Hi

Just wondering if anyone can help? I'm currently 40+6 with our first child. I've always had loads of Braxton Hicks so I pretty much ignore them.

I downloaded a contraction timer and was just testing it out on what I think are the Braxton Hicks just to see how it works.

It turns out that they are actually regular, just over 5 minutes apart and lasting about 50 seconds. I've been measuring for 40 minutes.

The thing is they don't hurt, is this just a warm up even though they are regular?

many thanks

I had this on Monday, but I'm 34 weeks, I was having BH even though regular at every 10 minutes, not painful and eventually stopped.
I would suggest just to keep measuring them, take some pain killers if needs be and if waters go then you know it's labour, good luck x

In my experience of one delivery, if you have to ask then its not labour ! Then again dd1 was back to back which makes contractions v v v painful.

Sounds like prelabour. Was like this for 48 hours for me with dc1. Tiring but not painful. Was a bit stop start too. Started sat am. Stopped Monday am for a whole 5 hours. Started proper contractions (and there's no mistaking it) Monday after lunch. Phoned labour ward at 2.30ish, 7cm on admission at 3.30, DS born at 6pm. Prelabour can be tiring but usually doing quite a lot.

Good luck, my advice would be to sleep when you can and when not tired get up and down the stairs, and bounce on the birth ball to get things going. Keep well hydrated and eat. Baby's probably on the way!

I had that most evenings for about 2 weeks before I went into labour. So it might be or it might not. Sorry, I know that's really not what you want me to say...