Question concerning second rising

I made challah in my Bosch Universal machine.  The texture seemed perfect when I took it out of the machine and it doubled after the first rise.  I then braided it and tried to let it rise again but it seemed to take forever.  It seemed somewhat thicker but after it was cooked, the challah ended up wide but not tall.  On a second rise, how can you tell if a braided bread and other breads have doubled?  Do they get taller as well as wider?  By making ropes to braid the bread, was I causing the bread not to rise well?

I finally cooked it which also took forever, definitely not the 40 minutes in the recipe.  I put the challah directly on the bottom shelf on unglazed quarry tiles while baking it.  Should I have used a cookie pan instead?

In the end, it tasted wonderful but hope that some of you expert bakers can answer my questions.