hello! thanks stephanie for sharing; my experience was not as goooood as that, but not too bad either:
water broke at 11:30pm (just when my hubby's annual dinner ended), went directly to hospital, no pain no contraction until 6:00am when i started to have mild contractions every 10 mins (not painful). it went more frequent and more painful until 6:30 evening----seems very long but really the pain is bearable (like bad period pain), plus i was so excited ; then push for almost an hour and baby's born. it was more tiring and hungry than painful, like a day of exercise.
and NEW MOMS, i read this somewhere and find it useful: don't focus on the "pain" --- we are scared of "pain" because we normally think of our body getting hurt or damaged ----- but when we give birth, the "pain" (contraction) is natural and is to HELP baby come out, it is not like having your hand chopped off or getting burnt think positively, also our hormones will help us here (i remember being so excited!)
SO RELAX!! BE PREPARED ---- PHYSICALLY AND MENTALLY!