We all know that "dad jokes" are absolutely terrible, but what about new-dad jokes? You know, jokes that should never EVER take place inside a delivery room. For one man, they went over much worse, and now he's ticked that some of his "best" material was not appreciated by a nurse in his wife's delivery room. And because of his sense of humor, she kicked him out. The dad is angry and looking for a second opinion: Was he wrong or was the nurse overreacting?
Although the man believed his jokes were "lighthearted," his wife's nurse seemed to disagree.
Any comedian will tell you that you need to read the room and know your crowd. Unfortunately, this dad got it so, so wrong. In a post on Reddit, he explained that he thought his jokes were harmless, but the "joyless hag of a nurse" didn't like his material.
"I calmly tried to placate the demented old boiler by explaining she has no right to be offended on other peoples behalf, but that just made her worse," he wrote.
The dad made a few "harmless" jokes about his wife's vagina, and even though she chuckled, her nurse did not.
Both during and after labor, the dad wasn't afraid to be himself and let his sense of humor show.
"*Approx 6 hours of grunting (her), farting (her mostly), and me telling my wife how awesome she is*
Wife: "How does it look?"
Me: "I feel like i'm watching my favorite restaurant burning down."
*Wife chuckles and punches me on the arm*"
And though it seemed both his wife and her doctor were receptive to his gags, the "fat old nurse goes (expletive), starts ranting and demands I leave the room," after he made another crack about the doctor stitching up his wife after she tore. And that little quip is what really set the nurse off. "I try to reason with her and she just started shrieking," he wrote. "I left and got a sandwich."
But despite the nurse's distaste, the dad felt that he had done nothing wrong. "Me and my wife have a very similar sense of humor and she was not in the least bit offended by what I said, did that nurse have the right to offended on behalf of my wife?" he asked.
People had to put it straight to the new dad: His jokes were awful.
One person in the comments summed up the dad's post and pointed out the flaws in his thinking. "I made a joke about genital mutilation just as my wife was getting her vag sewn up, and the nurse, who is bad because she is old and fat and un-(expletive)-able and doesn't like jokes about genital mutilation, yelled at me with her high-pitched female voice. AITA?" the person wrote. "Jesus Christ, some people."
"That nurse you just called fat hears nasty husbands say the same humorless joke all the time," wrote someone else. "It's not funny, and this whole post makes me feel sorry for the woman who just delivered your kid."
"I think this kind of humor is okay at home or around like-minded friends, but probably not the best spot around medical professionals," added a third person. "I know there’s the old joke about the ‘husband stitch’ but realistically there are also a huge plethora of problems that are an unfortunate reality postpartum (that includes painful intercourse following an episiotomy). While you might have [been] joking around I do believe this is a big ‘no-no’ in the obstetrics community and the nurse didn’t take kindly to the comment (probably on your wife’s part – and the fact that this is actually something that happens to women)."
But some people thought that the dad was completely in the clear.
"If you and your wife enjoy this kind of humor, then so be it. Nurse had no right to kick you out. All these people saying YTA have thin skin," someone commented.
"Frankly surprised so many people think this nurse was right for kicking the father out of the room his wife and newborn was because of a joke," someone else wrote. "Don't care how he described her, it doesn't change the situation at hand. Bottom line is that most of the people saying YTA just found the joke offensive, which doesn't actually matter, since neither him nor his wife were offended by it."
"If your wife, the one who’s vagina you were making fun of, wasn’t offended, then you are fine," added another person.
But let's not get it twisted. The nurse was only doing what she thought was in the best interest of her patient, and that was her job first and foremost.
These stories are based on posts found on Reddit. Reddit is a user-generated social news aggregation, web content rating, and discussion website where registered members submit content to the site and can up- or down-vote the content. The accuracy and authenticity of each story cannot be confirmed by our staff.
