My first two were induced - hard, nasty labours. Both went for the same amount of time - started the drugs at 6/7am and had bub at 8/9 at night, that whole time being complete agony from the drugs.

The third I was determined to go naturally. But I found I felt completely clueless - unless my waters broke or something obvious like that, I had no clue as to how I was going to tell I was in labour, cause I had STRONG BH all the time. Had 3 or 4 trips to the labour ward that were false alarms. Then I woke at 6am one day with the usual contractions - strong BH, but not like the induced ones. Had a bath, took it easy, went up to the hospital at about 12pm thinking it was another false alarm and I was already 6-7cm dialated. And compared to the inductions it was such an easy birth - he was born at 9pm, but the whole way through (until he turned posterior at the end and had us all worried for a short while) I was saying how easy this was to my hubby (compared to the other two, anyway!) MWs said it was more like a 1st birth. Now I am 2 weeks out from having #4 and going through the same 'how on earth am I going to be able to tell' thing

Good luck with it all!