Going into labor..???

I've been having contractions about every 2-3 minutes, lasting about a minute each. They were about 4-5 minutes apart, but they're getting closer together and more painful, my water hasn't broken... At my dr appt last Wednesday I was only dilated 1/2 cm and 1/2 thinned, could things have progressed so quickly? I'm a FTM so I don't know if these are BH or the real thing... Any advice??