A man goes to the hospital with his pregnant wife in labor, and about to give birth. In the labor/delivery room, the doctor doing the delivery suddenly barked out a couple orders to the nurses, who immediately went and fetched a couple trays of strange-looking instruments. One of the nurses escorted him out of the room and into the waiting area, explaining that there were complications, and she would be having immediate surgery. Understandably freaked out, the man paced for about two hours.
A nurse finally came into the waiting area, and he immediately asked about his wife.
"She'll be fine, we'll have to keep her here for a few days."
"What about my baby?"
The nurse got a pained look on her face, and started to explain that the baby didn't fare as well, and would likely never be what one could call "normal". She offered to take him to the ICU nursery to see for himself. Off they went.
As he entered the ICU, the first bassinette had a very small preemie in it with a cleft palate...
"Oh my God! What could be worse? Is that my baby? Doesn't matter, this is my first child- I'll look after it and love it, and in a few years, maybe we can afford the surgery to fix that cleft palate..."
"No sir, she's not yours."
A sigh of relief from the man, until he saw the next bassinette. In it was a child with no legs, and stunted little arms, who had a very bad case of hydrocephalus. His head was about the size of a watermelon, and he was hooked up to a bunch of machines to keep him alive.
"Oh my God- what could be worse? Poor boy, he'll never get to run and play with other kids...I imagine the bills will about kill me! But it's my son..."
"Sir, he's not your child either" said the nurse. She led him over to another bassinette, and inside was a giant ear, a good six-pounder...
"OH MY GOD!" cried the man. "What could be worse?"
The nurse put a reassuring hand on his shoulder, looked him in the eye and said "He's stone deaf!"