A Reddit user wrote about how she inadvertently embarrassed her son-in-law’s new wife in front of their family at dinner. According to the original poster (OP), “it wasn’t my intention, but it was.”
Background
The OP starts by talking about how her brother-in-law met his wife. They allegedly knew each other for seven months before deciding to elope.
The OP talked about how the family met her a few months ago and how she seemed nice but nervous. It was later revealed that she had bipolar disorder.
At this point, the OP revealed that she is a registered nurse and her husband is also a medical professional.
Dinner fight
OP’s mother-in-law invited the whole family to dinner, including her son-in-law and his wife. Over dinner, they talked about his wife’s bipolar diagnosis. She quickly got carried away with the conversation. As the OP described it: “Well, it didn’t take long for her to sink into this conversation. Uses hands and palms to speak, gets a little louder.”She then became angry and said she was “repulsed” by the fact that people who don’t have a diagnosis of bipolar disorder claim to be manic when “mania is purely a bipolar phenomenon.” This is where things went downhill.
The OP, being a medical professional, gently corrected her and said, “In fact, mania comes in all forms and is not limited to bipolar disorder. Even people with brain tumors are known to have manic episodes.”
The wife doubled down on her position and said the OP was wrong. The OP proceeded to show his wife a copy of his medical e-book to show her the various causes of manic episodes. The wife claimed that her doctor told her that manic episodes only occur in people with bipolar disorder.
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The wife also allegedly refused to read the e-book, so the OP turned to her husband, also a medical professional, and asked him, “Honey, you are a doctor, which causes manic episodes.” He immediately listed several things that could contribute to a manic episode.
The wife is furious at this point. She starts accusing OP and her husband of trying to outplay her and she swore she “knew what she was talking about”.
The OP’s husband joked, “Obviously not, if you’re going to sit here arguing and covering up disease symptoms against two healthcare workers,” then left. The wife then allegedly started crying, saying that the OP deliberately embarrassed her and then yelled at everyone to “stop staring at her” before storming out of the room.
OP’s brother-in-law was furious at OP and told her that she should have kept her mouth shut and not corrected her.
Did the OP have to keep her mouth shut? Is it better to leave someone uneducated, or is it important to educate them when they are wrong, especially about their own illness? What would you do in this scenario?
You can read the original Reddit post here.
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