25 and a half hour labour

During my pregnancy I talked with many mothers as I was curious about their labour and delivery experiences. Stupid me didn't think to ask about what came after that.
Some women told me about their six-hour labour, one even said she had two of her babies in two hours. I think the longest labour was 10 hours. So judging by the information I gathered I thought I couldn't possibly go longer than 10 hours.
I was firmly against any pain medication and I was definitely not having an epidural! Well after 16 hours of extreme pain and vomiting the doctors and nurses pleaded with me to consider an epidural. If they could ease my mind about the side effects of the epidural I would consider it. They did and I opted to have the epidural put in but only by an expert. I'm glad I did.
Anything can happen, all of it was so unexpected. I went in to it thinking I had my mind made up and every last thing changed! Never in a million years would I have thought I'd be in labour for more than 25 hours.
Expect the unexpected.