A simple strategy (like changing positions) can make the world of difference to your perception of pain and coping with the labour. Sometimes the woman is so absorbed in the dealing with her labour that she forgets to do this. It may mean that her support person, or caregiver, needs to suggest it. If you are comfortable, stay where you are, if not, then try to make the effort to move.
A change of position can help change your focus, take the pain off an area (say an 'all fours' position for back pain) and help you to be able to deal with a 'step up' in the intensity of the pain. Do not underestimate the effectiveness of this tactic.
There are not many women who can labour comfortably on their back. (Who knows how our mothers did it?), so if you do have to have a vaginal examination, don't feel you have to stay there once it is over. Even turning on your side can change unbearable pain into a more manageable discomfort. Kneeling, sitting over the back of a chair, leaning on a bean bag, sitting on the toilet or a birth stool, walking if you have the energy, all these can change a desperate situation into a more tolerable one. You can always stop, or go back to where you were, if it doesn't help.
Our experience is that women left in a room with a bed, beanbag and a mat, will rarely spontaneously use the bed, except perhaps to kneel on, or rest over a beanbag. They just don't naturally gravitate to it, preferring to be on all fours on a mat, or to stand.
Unfortunately, not many delivery suites routinely set up rooms in this manner (unlike birth centres, and of course, staying at home). If you only have one high, narrow bed in the middle of the room, then of course that is what you will end up using. Some of the newer electronic beds can be manoeuvred into various positions.