13 Doctor Visits That Had Truly Unexpected Endings

A simple doctor’s visit can seem routine — until it isn’t. For some people, what started as a regular checkup turned into something they’ll never forget. From unsettling encounters to shocking mistakes and moments that defy explanation, these stories reveal just how unpredictable a trip to the doctor can be.

• My doctor retired, but a couple of years later he came back to the practice, and I started seeing him again. As I was lying on the exam table, he patted my stomach and said, “This wasn’t here the last time I saw you.” © scrodytheroadie / Reddit

• I constantly complained to my doctor that I couldn’t breathe when walking and often felt short of breath. I was always tired and fatigued, and I’d get dizzy if I walked for too long. She always brushed it off, telling me to get more sleep or drink more water — even though I was already doing both. Eventually, I made an appointment to speak with her face to face, and she flat-out told me I was lazy and just needed to exercise more. I was so embarrassed because my husband was with me, and she made me feel like a complete couch potato. I switched doctors, and my new one immediately ordered blood work — something the other doctor should have done in the first place — and found out I was severely anemic, to the point of needing blood transfusions. © NotAsPlanned- / Reddit

• I’m a big guy, played O-Line in college, and once had a doctor make me do push-ups in the exam room because he wanted me “to prove I was in decent shape” despite my size. The worst part? He was a urologist giving me the results, telling me I had a urinary tract infection.
  © ShyGuysDiceBlock / Reddit

• A coworker went for a medical exam with a dermatologist. The doctor asked her to step behind a screen and undress to the waist. As she began undressing, she asked, “Should I take off my skirt too?” Startled, the doctor nearly fell off his chair and quickly clarified, “No! Just from the top to the waist!”

• Before we were engaged and before we were even living together, my fiancée went to a GP for some persistent headaches she had. The GP looked at her birthdate, saw she was 32, and started lecturing her that time was running out, she needed to have kids ASAP, and she needed to go home immediately and tell me that we were going to start trying for children.
  Note: She didn’t mention anything about kids at all, and he didn’t know her history at all — legit, the first (and last) time she’d ever seen him. © Dropbbear / Reddit

• My brother’s pregnant wife went for her first ultrasound, which revealed twins. Overwhelmed with emotion, she called her husband, crying, and urged him, “Come to the hospital immediately.” He rushed over, nervous and anxious. Without saying a word, his wife handed him the ultrasound picture. He stared at it, confused. She pointed and said, “Look — one head, and another head.” His face paled as he began to sob. “Our baby... has two heads?”

• I had just given birth, and my daughter needed to stay in the hospital, but I was ready to be discharged. The doctor talked to my husband like I wasn’t there. He told him I had postnatal depression (apparently, I wasn’t supposed to be upset about leaving the hospital without my baby). The doctor handed him a prescription for antidepressants and told my husband he needed to force me to take them. © rowenaravenclaw0 / Reddit

• I went to the gynecologist. It was a new doctor. As he examined me, he whispered, “Your husband is a lucky guy!” I felt like punching him.
  But when I got home and undressed, I realized he hadn’t actually examined me properly. The checkup had been rushed — he barely even looked. I was so caught off guard by his inappropriate comment that I hadn’t noticed at the time.
  The next day, I got a call from the receptionist asking me to come for an emergency 2nd visit. I was shocked to discover that this guy wasn’t a doctor at all. He had faked his paperwork and diplomas, and in reality, he had dropped out of medical school after only eight months.
  It finally made sense — why the exam had been so rushed and why he had tried to distract me with that disgusting comment. Thankfully, he was caught early and didn’t get the chance to put any woman’s life at risk.

• I had a period of time when I was exhausted without knowing why. After blood and urine tests, I went to get my heart checked to make sure it was functioning properly. So this doctor is performing an echocardiogram of my heart, then suddenly stops and says, “Damn, that doesn’t look good,” before running out of the examination room.
  I tried to stay calm, but the fact that a doctor was alarmed by something he saw in my body made me think he had found something horrid and unusual. A moment later, the doctor returned with another doctor, who greeted me and said, “Okay, show me.” The young doctor put the probe back on my chest, and the older doctor smirked and said, “No wonder — that’s the wrong spot. If you look at the heart from that angle, the aorta looks extremely distended.”
  “So, everything is fine?” I asked. “Nothing wrong with your heart,” he answered, then rolled his eyes and said, “Interns. Sorry, sir.” © Martyn V. Halm (Combat Pragmatist) / Quora

• I went to my old doctor for allergy pills. I had just moved in with my partner, and he had a cat. She gave me the prescription but then also asked how old the cat was and, in her words, said, “Maybe it will just die soon.” © yslhc / Reddit

• I had a hard lump under my belly button that was excruciatingly painful. I had a hernia there when I was seven, so I went to my GP to get some advice/scans on how to deal with it since it was now very painful.
  The doctor felt around and was like, “Oh yeah, there is a lump!” while I was crying in agony. She then told me not to worry about it because it was only small and that “pregnant women get hernias much worse than this.”
  A few years of debilitating pain later, I finally found a new doctor who sent me for scans right away and put me on a waiting list for a repair. When they finally took it out, it was actually an endometrioma. At every step of the way, doctors shrugged off how painful it actually was, thinking it was just a hernia. It was the blasé attitude that always got me — even from the ER doctors. © katrat1706 / Reddit

• I was 18 and had just had a baby, and my epidural was taking a long time to wear off. The nurse came in to transfer me to the recovery room, and I told her I still didn’t have any feeling in my legs. She said, “It should have worn off half an hour ago,” and started trying to get me out of bed and into the wheelchair.
  I said I was going to need help, so another nurse came in. They had to move my legs off the bed (which should have been the second clue), and then they hoisted me up. I, of course, crumpled immediately. As they were trying to get me off the floor, the first nurse yelled at me, “You have to try to stand up!”
  I yelled back, “What part of ’I can’t feel my legs’ did you not hear?!” When my mom heard about it, she went and gave them a piece of her mind. I didn’t see that particular nurse again. © sugabeetus / Reddit

• I woke up one morning unable to hear out of my left ear. After weeks of pain, antibiotics, and endless doctor visits, nothing seemed to help. Desperate for answers, I finally went to an ear specialist. Five minutes later, the specialist saw that my eardrum was not infected, but rather covered in wax. By the end of my visit, I had my hearing restored. It’s safe to say I was furious that the doctors misdiagnosed me for an entire two months and gave me antibiotics into me that I didn’t need. © Cosmic_Noodles / Reddit

Another group that often brings amusing and unexpected stories are neighbors. While some people are lucky enough to live next to kind and helpful ones, others aren’t so fortunate — and end up dealing with neighbors who seem to test anyone’s patience.