The spacing of the contractions was a curse and a blessing. The nice thing was that I had ample time to rest and recover between them. The bad thing was that I had plenty of time to dread the next one. At least if the contractions would have come faster, I would have been forced into that primitive, coping mode that might have helped take a little of the edge off. I was also VERY annoyed that I couldn't use the tub for relief.
Water is known to help speed up labor for many women, while also providing pain relief.
But not for me. I was feeling pretty put out by that. At 2 pm, I requested another pelvic. I thought I was going to cry when I learned I was at the exact same place, the only thing that was different was that there were more forewaters, which was a likely culprit of my stalled labor, because the baby's head wasn't as firm on the cervix as it needed to be. The midwives felt strongly that I needed to put gravity to work for me and recommended starting out with walking between contractions and squatting during them.