My birthday was last week and I have found myself thinking about it more than I expected. I have never really considered myself to be a ‘birthday person’ but over the last week I have been reflecting more about why that is.
Birthdays in the past
I once wrote a post about this, talking about birthdays and how I felt about it at the age of 19, and I’ve got to say, I don’t feel like my opinions have changed a lot in the last few years. I used to feel confused I guess, like why on this specific day did people seem to care more about me, than every other day of the year.
Why was I more special on this one day?
I always felt like I was celebrating for other people, that it was never really about me, but about doing what would make my family and friends happy. I didn’t like the attention and I didn’t see the point of celebrating. I am not sure whether that be because of years of bad birthdays or just because I was shy and didn’t want to be an inconvenience, who really knows?
What’s the Same?
I have stayed the same with my stance on most things that I believed at 19. While I feel more confident in myself now that I am 23, I still don’t like the attention, and I’d rather keep my birthday on the down low. I still feel the need to please others, like this year when my day didn’t meet my expectations, I was more worried about how that would make my mum feel, than how it made me feel.
Living 17,000km away from home has been hard and it’s even harder when I feel people drifting away. It had been months since I had heard from some of my friends but then on this one day, I finally heard back. It just made me think a bit about why it feels like people care more on my birthday than they do the rest of the year.
What’s Changed?
I still struggle a lot with birthdays, but this one felt different. This year I was completely alone for my birthday. I had made this whole plan where I was just going to spend the day doing things that I loved: go to bookshops in a cute little part of London, sit in cafes and in the park and just spend some time reading. Then spend the evening watching a movie whilst eating pizza. I was honestly so excited, but the day wasn’t what I had pictured.
I also had plans with one of my friends that fell through, which honestly was harder than I expected. So, this birthday I found myself being more self-aware and thinking, why do I hate my birthday? Why is it that I am so hell bent on keeping this day that most people enjoy, a secret?
Reflecting on the day
So given that my birthday didn’t go exactly to plan, it gave me a lot of time to think and reflect on myself, my situation and why it is that birthdays feel weird to me. As I walked through the park, crying because of a mix of hunger, overwhelm, homesickness and disappointment, it gave me time to think.
For some context, over the years my birthday often falls on Easter Sunday, which in itself is really cool but unfortunately has meant that many times throughout my childhood and teenage years, my birthday has come second to that, and often people have forgotten my birthday because they are so busy with Easter. As well as that, I went through years when I was younger where I was struggling so deeply with making friends that I went those years with no one outside of my family wishing me a happy birthday. Since I didn’t like the attention, I felt weird when I had it, and I felt like this inconvenience where I didn’t want to make people feel like they had to be nice, or had to celebrate me.
So, I guess during my birthday this year, which turned into a day of reflection, I realised that it is not so much that I hate birthdays, but I just have this fear of disappointment so I decide to not tell people so that they can’t let me down.
Don’t get me wrong, I have had some great birthdays over the years, but I have also had some not-so-great days which has made celebrating harder for me. When my friend didn’t show up, I didn’t blame them but I was also struggling with this idea of why am I upset about something that I didn’t want in the first place?
Birthdays have just always felt weird for me and despite now being 23, I don’t think I’ve cracked the code yet, but I’m starting to understand it a little bit more.
Does anyone feel like this about birthdays?
Talk soon,
-Soph xx
