False labour veterans - how long did your real labour last?

[Peregrin]

Pretty much sums it up! I've been having episodes of false labour on and off since week 37. My due date is this Saturday. Baby is still snug inside, my cervix has been 2-2.5 cm dilated for two weeks now.

I am curious what your experience was with the real thing. Did it go very fast? Were you able to tell early enough that you were in proper labour? I need to have an epidural for a medical reason and am a bit concerned about missing my window for this, given that by now I am used to contractions lasting over a minute within five minutes of each other, and then not progressing further.

DS1, false labour from about 33w ... waters went at 40+4, induced a day later, he arrived the day after that.

Sorry, but you did ask!

I'm currently 13 +4 with dc3 but with ds2 I had a false labour at just gone 37wks. I was like you with contractions lasting over 1 minute less than 5 minutes apart not too painful though. I was examined and told I was about 2cm dilated. Unfortunately I that went on until I was 9 days overdue when I finally went into proper labour so I had nearly 5 weeks of on and off period pains and niggles.

It was easy to tell the difference though as I found the contractions more painful when it was the proper labour and obviously they didn't stop. I started getting contractions on the Thursday night and had him the next night at a few minutes to midnight. So it wasn't a quick but I don't think I was in established labour until later on the Friday so probably only about 5hrs of established labour. What I did find was I was only 3cms when I got to hospital but progressed to 10cms in 1hr 30mins and only pushed for 3 minutes. So although it wasn't a quick labour overall the last part went very quickly and the pushing was incredible as my body just took over. I didn't have any pain relief and coped fine, it wasn't any more painful than my labour with ds1.

Hope you go into labour soon I know how frustrating the waiting is especially with false starts all the time!

Horry, you must have felt that is so unfair!

cake thank you for sharing all these details, very helpful! I hope you didn't get a bad tear with such a fast delivery.

Ah it wasn't so bad

By contrast they counted "established" labour for DS2 at about 90 mins and I only pushed four times. I am currently 34+4 with DC3 and daren't sneeze