[joyful mother]

I've had it done! Sometimes it has worked sometimes it has not! With my youngest I was 6-7 cm dilated 1 in the afternoon and still not in real labor (dh checked me the night before we went to bed and that's where I was) so we went home the midwife arrived, checked me, stripped the membranes and I went into labor within a few minutes. My cervix was still 7 next time we checked in an hour but totally effaced (only 25% earlier) and a little later we had our baby! If you are ready it can speed things up, if your not ready don't worry you won't have a premie baby.

On stripping the membranes and the water breaking make sure the person stripping the membranes knows what they are doing.