We might not like to admit it, but people aren’t perfect. This is definitely true of all of us. Sometimes, people find out about their partner’s intense imperfections in a really terrible way.

These 14 stories from medical professionals about delivering babies that obviously aren’t related to the “dad” in the room are truly wild!

14. Total silence.

Medical student here: shadowing in OBS/GYN and was present for a natural delivery. As soon as I got in there I could tell something was wrong- husband was stood away from the mum (usually they’re near by or holding their hand).

Apart from the mother pushing and the midwife instructing her on what to do the room was in total silence, no words of encouragement from the husband. When the baby eventually came out it was clearly not his, both parents were white and the baby was as black as anyone you’ve ever seen.

The midwife explained that sometimes the pigmentation can be a little bit different immediately after birth and tried to make a joke of it but it fell flat. The baby was crying and was given to the mother.

She started crying, the husband walked over to stand by the bed looked at the kid. Then he started crying. I’m now stood awkwardly watching unsure of whether I should start talking or make a joke or anything.

At this point the mother starts bawling. She keeps saying how sorry she is and the husband just leans down and kisses her on the forehead before turning and leaving the room sobbing to himself. I don’t think he ever came back.

13. Epidural or truth serum?

When I was a nursing student, I had an OB clinical with a pregnant woman who thought the epidural was some kind of “truth serum.” When her boyfriend left the room, she shouted “oh no, these drugs gonna make me say things I’m not allowed to say!”

The anesthesiologist just kept saying “Ma’am these drugs don’t affect what you say. If you say anything inappropriate, that’s on you.” Then the mother just screams “don’t let him look at my phone when he comes back! This ain’t his baby but I need his money!”

The anesthesiologist pulled me out of the room because he wanted to laugh and then tell me that’s why I should be in anesthesia, because I would get to sedate the wild patients.

12. Two super sticky situations.

A lady giving birth to her second child. Asked for her husband to be present for the discussion as usual. Was told he was away working in a Middle-Eastern country for a bit less than two years, and would be coming home on leave “soon.” This was in a conservative South Indian state, tried to keep a poker face with the patient. Don’t know what happened later.

This one is a scumbag who cheated on his pregnant wife. This made me angry with the guy, but again we have to stay professional and neutral. A young lady (early twenties) brought in for “safe confinement.”

Asked for marital history, she starts crying and says she was unmarried, at her sister’s house to help the sister with her pregnancy by doing chores round the house and taking care of her, when her brother-in-law got cosy with her, and they ended up in a physical relationship.

Felt sorry for the sister, the primary victim here.

11. Watch those blood types.

I was working on the postpartum mother-baby unit as the resident pediatrician when I walked into a room to talk to the parents and examine the baby. The mom is jabbering while I’m examining the baby and I’m trying my best not to be rude and answer.

She starts telling me how her other kid is blood type B, but she’s type A and dad’s type O (for everyone reading this without medical or science knowledge, you absolutely cannot have a baby with blood type B unless mom or dad are B or AB, except in rare cases of chimera).

She explains that they cannot figure out how that would happen and even went to a geneticist who couldn’t find a reason. I quickly changed subjects and said goodbye. I couldn’t look the dad husband in the eye after I heard that.

10. Wonder if they ever found out?

I was new to L & D but an experienced nurse. Mom and supposed Dad were joking with their family that the baby’s 3D ultrasound didn’t look like Dad while Mom was in labor. We have the baby later in the morning, and baby’s face was pretty smushed…still had the classic “potato” look.

A little while later, I’m helping mom clean up when the pedestrian comes in. She examines the baby, congratulates the parents, and tells them baby’s blood type…which absolutely couldn’t be Dad’s. He insists that he’s B, mom is O, and baby is A…oops!

They start arguing and Mom keeps insisting that Dad calls his mom to ask about his blood type. Maybe he was wrong?

The pedi and I just backed out of the room saying that we’d be back. He stormed out right after that. He apparently came back later, but I don’t know how it all ended.

9. It’s not too hard to figure out.

I’m an ultrasound tech and I’ve had several situations where women ask if I can tell exactly which day she got pregnant.

Once, I told the mom when her due date was (first trimester screening, difficult to be too far off that early; couple of days maybe, but this case it was weeks off of her supposed last period.) and she insisted I was wrong.

Husband put two and two together and was furious.

High tension room after that.

8. How did she not know?!

I attended a birth where the notes on file had “DON’T MENTION GESTATIONAL AGE IN ROOM” all over them. The mother was young and had been dating her boyfriend for around 8 months. She found out she was pregnant when she got out of a pool and her boyfriend said “Babe. You look pregnant.”

That late in the game, ultrasound measurements get unreliable, so the initial scan had estimated around 22 weeks. A follow up scan added around 2 months to this number, but this also didn’t line up with current boyfriend, so she leaned into her right to privacy and asked everyone to keep the actual gestational age private.

We were called to the room to deliver this baby with her, boyfriend and boyfriend’s mum in the room. The whole time I was reminding myself of the mum’s right to privacy and kept my mouth shut.

A plump, very term baby came out and we didn’t make any extra fuss about it. I kinda hope that the boyfriend’s mum twigged to the fact that this baby was not 8 weeks premature. I don’t think he would have.

7. Genetics are wild.

Labor and delivery nurse here! So this is a bit of a spin on this question. I had a married couple expecting their first baby, both white parents. They had been together for years and were so excited. When the baby was born it came out looking African American with really dark skin. It was an adorable kid but clearly not what either of the parents expected.

They got into this huge argument and the father wanted a paternity test. Which, who could blame the guy? I’d probably do the same thing. The wife swore she never cheated and agreed to the test to prove her faithfulness.

Sure enough, the paternity test came back showing that the baby was the father’s biological child.

After some genetic testing and family tree searching on his part it turned out he had an African American family member a few generations back and the gene just hadn’t expressed itself again until now. Genetics are super weird.

6. It happens more than you think.

My friends who is a Dr and I were just talking about this yesterday! Apparently this kind of thing is more common than you’d think!

One time she said man came into the maternity ward with his wife who was in the deep throws of labour. Her midwife soon noticed he kept disappearing out of the room with different random excuses each time.

It didn’t take the staff long to realize he was actually visiting another patient in the same ward. Wasn’t this guy’s day… as his wife and side chick were both in labour at the same time in the same hospital.

He apparently spent some time running between the two rooms before it all unravelled…

The other story was one of a couple that had been battling infertility for a long time. The husband’s whole family were excited and waiting just outside the ward in the waiting room for their precious little ones arrival.

The labour became an emergency c-section, and my friend says even the experienced doctor (who she was studying under at the time) was emotional going into the procedure – as they realised how long-awaited this moment had been for the parents.

The excited and touching mood in the room drastically shifted however when the Dr pulled the baby out and the whole room saw that this white couple and an obviously black baby….

My friend said wheeling the baby into the room filled with Dad’s family was one of the most awkward moments of her life… The story then came out that “Dad” had gone away for a work trip one weekend 9 months prior and Mum had taken advantage of this and “celebrated” the arrival of a ship full of American soldiers that arrived in town.

5. Hopefully, it’s true.

From an acquaintance who’s an RN in obstetrics:

White woman was giving birth with her white husband on hand. A distinctly brown baby presented itself in the doctor’s hands, and she says you could hear the intake of breath followed by silence as everyone waited for the dad’s reaction.

Then he broke the tension: “She’s just like Mom!” Apparently his mother was south Asian and his father, whom he obviously took after, white. The mother’s apprehension faded with a “Yea-ah! Isn’t that something, honey?” that apparently convinced the father, if no one else in the room.

As mother, child, and putative dad were whisked away to recovery, the surgeon said quietly “God save them from Ancestry DNA.”

4. This one is tough!

Respiratory therapist in Neonatal ICU and had to go to deliveries. One time baby came out and had syphilis and so did Mom, but dad didn’t. To explain it she actually used the “from a bus seat” excuse and the dad bought it. Because he wanted to.

He married her during the last trimester of pregnancy because he thought the baby was his. Only there was another thing, baby was very jaundice…and black. Both mom and “dad” were white.

Husband didn’t pick up on it for a couple days. He kept talking about how bad the jaundice must be because he’s getting darker.” (Black babies often are born with lighter skin than they’ll have, as if they tan over the next little while).

Eventually our oldest and sassy nurse taking care of baby said “it’s a beautiful baby, a beautiful black baby. Isn’t he daddy?” He stopped coming in after that.

3. Best friends forever?

My sister is a OBGYN who comes home one day detailing this chaos a couple caused in the delivery room. Priceless moment as she described it was when my sister came out to ask who the father was of the baby girl, Two dudes stood up to simultaneously say “I am”.

And so it began.. As the two “Best Friends” both thinking sat together thinking that one is there to support the other; neither of them knew that she was seeing both of them together and she did not know who the father either.

2. “There’s no difference.”

L&D nurse here (using Bf account). Had a lady who was induced and it was her 3rd baby. Usually by the 3rd mom’s usually aren’t that nervous but this lady’s nerves were out of this world. She kept asking if we knew what time the baby would come and kept asking for a vaginal exam.

The husband was there through it all and was very loving. When the husband stepped out to get something to eat, she told me she had gone to DR and had slept with a white guy (her and her husband were both dark) and that she knew the baby wasn’t her husband’s.

I wasn’t there to deliver her but I heard the baby came out looking dark so idk if the guy ever found out. Poor guy seemed clueless.

But this isn’t a rare occurrence. We just treat them the same. There’s no difference. If the SO doesn’t know, we can’t tell them cause of HIPPA and if he does know then it’s all good. I’ve never seen a father flip out but if they did, we would just call hospital police and escort him out cause of patient safety.

My coworker told me a story that I’m not sure how true it is but you never know. She says that there was a lady who got pregnant, told the husband that she had to live with her mom in the US (she’s originally from DR and her husband doesn’t have papers) because her mom was sick.

She had the baby here and told her husband that her cousin had cheated on her husband and the cousin didn’t want her husband to find out so the lady was going to adopt the baby so her cousin husband wouldn’t find out. But that sounds too juicy to be real.

1. Again with the blood types!

We had a case where a baby was born anemic, and we needed to give the child a transfusion. Baby was O+, mom was A+.

So we called on the dad.

He’s AB+, which if you read up on how blood type is passed down, does not yield an O+ baby. You either get an A+ baby, B+ baby and AB+ baby.

So……

Yeah, it was awkward telling the dad he wasn’t a match AND he had to go find someone who could donate for the child. Whoops.

It seems if there is one thing we have all learned, it’s that blood types are not to be trifled with.

Which of these stories really surprised you? Let us know in the comments!