It's one of those which people won't believe!! Nothing to do with my body or any so called birth skills, just one of those things.
6pmish I get the pop. I order a Chinese take away for DH and I when nothing dribbles out. 7pm, eating the take away, start getting painful "braxton hicks" (LOL). Ring the birth centre and they say relax, ring back in an hour or two with an update and sleep on it etc.
By the time an hour comes round, I can't talk or lie down when these are happening - I have to squat/sit and go hnnnggggg - and when DH times them they are 2 minutes apart. When I ring the birth centre I struggle to explain, they say to come in even if it's a bit early.
Terrified taxi driver keeps asking if I'm OK. 
Looking back maybe he's been at his DP's births and knew how far I was?
Get into the door of the birth centre, think I'm going to poo my pants, nope - 4.5cm dilated. At this point the idea of having trousers on or standing up when contracting feels wrong. Also v v intense and I want some relief. Apparently I just said "Oh good that means you can give me gas and air please", dropped my trousers and leapt into the pool like my life depended on it. I also kept apologising for getting the urge to push.
Spend an hour or so huffing gas and air in the pool and going 'hngggggg' and 'woooo' ('like an owl' says DH) and flopping about in the pool generally thinking 'f**k me this hurts' and wanting to poo out my whole internal organs (only way I can describe it). Go through transition - apparently - where I apparently accused DH of 'stealing' my gas and repeatedly told the mw I was going to 'do a big shit' and how sorry I was to spoil the nice room for a few minutes. MW assures me their cleaners are ever so good. Nevertheless I kind of start to believe I will push out all my digestive organs and die for a moment, which passes.
My mum turns up 11.30pm (2nd birth partner in case it took ages as a 1st birth) 2 min before mw announces she can see a head and would I like to feel. At this point I was just basically huffing on that gas like my life depended on it and gave my mum a feeble wave. She couldn't believe where I was time wise.
Pushed and pushed - made more weird noises. I remember this like it was an hour or something but apparently it was 10 minutes.
Felt something brushing my leg and asked what it was - it was my baby!!
Because she shot out I had a 2nd degree tear but it was a 'simple' one to repair thankfully.
No idea whatsoever how on earth I managed the elusive 'quick but slow enough to get to hospital' birth. Just luck I reckon. Whew!