My Husband Sent Pictures Of My Postpartum Vagina To His Co-Workers

I come to you with a cautionary tale of the ultimate birth announcement fail for new or even seasoned dads. Thankfully this one has a happy ending. (NO, not like that) We’re still married and like one another so I’ll chalk that up as a good sign.

Shortly after delivering our third child (our first girl who was the size of a 10 lb. bowling ball), I was oh, say a tad sore and wanted to attempt to take a shower the next afternoon. My mom was kind enough to help me and I soldiered through it. I was feeling worn out but refreshed when we finally emerged from the hospital bathroom. I couldn’t wait to lay back down in bed to relax while the baby napped, but instead I was quickly intercepted by my husband. That’s when things took a sharp left turn down Disaster Drive.

The birth announcement fail was revealed in a conversation that went like this:

Hubby: “I sent these pictures to work to show them the baby. They’re good, right?”

Me (as I quickly glance at them): “You’re kidding me, right?”

Hubby: “No. Why? I think they look good.”

Me (in a rising hysterical yell): “OH MY GOD! You better me kidding me. This is not funny! The one of you, me and the baby was right after the delivery and I am NOT covered up down there! It looks like a homicide went down! Did you even LOOK at them?”

Hubby (in a rising and panicked voice): “Well, yeah. And I even had your dad look at them before I sent them!”

My parents are in the room watching all of this transpire and my dad’s eyes are bulging out of his head. Dad starts trying to defend them both saying,“We were just looking at your faces, it was a cute family photo…. Well, from the top up!”

My dad is cracking up, my mom’s face is painted with horror and shock and my head is starting to pound and hurt as bad as my lady parts.

My husband immediately goes into damage control after he says about 15 times in succession, “Oh no, oh my God, how did I miss that?”

In his disbelief, my husband turns to us muttering, “Well, why did they even take this picture? Who does that?”

It took every last bit of restraint I had for my head to not pop off and start spinning around as I yelled with a clenched jaw (if that’s even possible), “YOU ASKED THE NURSE TO TAKE THE PHOTO! AND HAVE YOU EVER HEARD OF THE *****@%## CROP TOOL ON YOUR PHONE? GET IT TOGETHER! FOR THE LOVE OF **%##!”

He goes into the bathroom and immediately tries to call his manager, but he can’t get through on the number he had in his phone. He finally finds another number and this is how the conversation goes (as I am running through all the terrible scenarios of how this is NOT how one would EVER want to go viral and how the kids are going to have to change school districts–not because of some stupid thing they did–which is, you know, to be expected from kids– but rather because of some stupid thing their 40 year old father and 68 year old grandfather did!)

Hubby: “Oh, hey! How are you? So yes, baby’s great and oh yes, my wife is doing SO well! Um, yes so I sent you some photos that I’m going to need you to NOT look at and delete. YEP, just don’t even open them. Believe me!” His boss probably thought he sent him something highly inappropriate and he’d be correct!

Hubby: “Hmmm… I see…so you didn’t get anything from me? I sent them at least 10 minutes ago.” My initial horror and panic, which was about at a solid 8 when all this started, was now off the charts. And, yes, my mesh panties were in a bunch because I’m thinking the only thing worse than his co-workers seeing this is the possibility of a random stranger receiving them.

Hubby (with nervous laughter)- “Okay, well if you do get them please don’t forward them on to the group at work. Um yeah, I sent one that should NOT have been in there. Ha! Okay, thanks.” He proceeds to hang up. All words escape me as I consider asking for another epidural to MY FACE to make this madness end.

He sheepishly comes out of the bathroom and continues to frantically search in his phone again and sees he has several texts saying “message failed” from the pics he sent to his manager. It turns out he accidentally texted them to his manager’s home phone number so they didn’t go through. All I know is that aged me at least 5 years so I came into the hospital pregnant at 38 and left 2 days later with a baby at 43!

Lessons learned:

1. My husband should not have smartphone access with photo capability to send to colleagues or anyone in the continental U.S. for at least one week following the birth of his child.

2. When he does, he needs a female to double check what he’s about to send out (as evidenced by the fact both he and my dad missed my lady parts in the shot). No woman would miss that! But thank God my dad did miss that because OMG how weird and awkward would that have been?

3. I plan to use this birth announcement fail story to horrify our children about the dangers of accidental sexting (from their parents) so I am very confident we won’t have any issues with that in the future.