In general I make too big of a deal about my birthday and make myself unnecessarily upset. It's July 3rd so it consistently bad for a lot of people.
This year was better than average because I didn't make a big deal of it. Being pregnant and therefore sober probably helped me keep some perspective as well. A few extra friends came out and we just played trivia like we do most Thursdays.
16. I was in the middle of fucking nowhere brittany on a school trip. My mother forgot. We were served eels for dinner, the cake was gross and by the time dinner was over all the bars in the village had closed. So we resigned ourselves to hanging out in the hotel bar. The silver lining was the free kir royales the bartender gave us.
The worst was my mom forgetting though. I still have not let her live that down.
20 and 21 were both bad. I was away from home for the first time on my 20th and my friends didn't do anything to celebrate. I ended up eating Dominos pizza, alone in my dorm room.
I was the oldest of my friends on my 21st, so nobody to go out with. I think we went to Applebee's for dinner (nicest restaurant in my tiny college town, lol). It just felt like a waste of a big birthday.
The day of my 16th was also shitty. I didn't pass my driving test and it seemed like everyone had forgotten my birthday. However, my friends had planned a surprise party for me, so intended up to be a good day! I still don't like surprise parties though!
19 was awkward. I was casually dating this guy from school who was part of our large friend group, but I found myself calling/texting/wanting to hang out with my now-FI more than my new kind-of boyfriend, so I knew I had to end it.
I broke it off with the guy on Thursday, which shouldn't have been a problem except for the fact that he was my date to the dance on Friday AND I had previously invited him to COME HOME WITH ME Saturday to celebrate my birthday with friends and family.
He was overly distraught by the breakup which threw me. He cried and told me he'd like to finish off the weekend as planned. I felt guilty so I agreed. This was a pretty terrible decision because he clearly was upset the entire time. He left the dance early in super dramatic fashion and made a mini-scene in front of my family. And then we had to drive home together back to school. I still cringe.
23, on the other hand, fell 8 weeks after my surgery and was one of the best birthdays ever. I was able to walk (!) all the way to the river to go out to eat with FI, my dad, and my siblings. I had such a fresh perspective and felt really lucky to just be able to do the simple things. It's kind of sad how quickly that feeling fades; it's too easy to get bogged down by daily stressors.
Post by UnderProtest on Sept 1, 2014 9:15:34 GMT -5
I don't have the greatest track records with birthdays.
18- Just moved and was separated from the love of my life (my first real boyfriend) and had no friends. I think I went out to lunch with my parents and went to work. 20- Sucky because I was getting my wisdom teeth out the next day and was freaked out about that. 21- Was in France on a study abroad trip with an ex-boyfriend. 22 or 23- My now husband's grandmother passed away. 31 or 32- Sucked because I couldn't get pregnant and was mourning that I thought I would have kids by then. I think that's all I remember.
But my husband beats me. His birthday is during the BUSIEST time of year for work so he never gets to have fun or celebrate. He always works on his birthday, no matter the day of week. He will be 40 next year and I have to try to do something fun.
29 was actually my best birthday! My bachelorette party was the night before my birthday, so I rang in my birthday with my closest friends and cousins. And I spent my actual birthday with my family and DH. We got married 4 weeks later.
But, my birthday's over the years haven't always been smooth. Random not great things happened most years in my teens through my early 20's (ranging from more serious things like my grandma passing away a few days before my 13th birthday to getting a flat tire while out to dinner one year with my parents for a birthday in my early 20's, and various other things in years in between). I love the concept of my birthday, but in reality, I prefer to lay low with DH and maybe a small dinner with my parents and grandmother.
Probably my 30th which was last week because I had to drive 6.5 hours (I HATE driving) home. I also had to say bye to DH the day before and won't see him for at least a month.
The only good thing that happened was DH had long stemmed roses delivered which he's never done before. But he didn't get me the yoga mat I wanted
My birthday fell during finals week in college so it sucked a few times.
A year or two ago, DH got annoyed with me for no good reason and ruined my day. This past year, DH was so self absorbed with his first work trip in the past 6 years that he didn't get me anything. I didn't care that he was gone on my birthday but cared that all I got was a phone call (he was gone less than a week). Two weeks later when I realized no gift was coming, I put on my big girl pants and told him that while we don't do gifts for our anniversary and Christmas (and he protests V day), I would like a gift for my birthday. It took him just a few minutes to order on amazon because he had a note with a gift idea sitting by his wallet for months (which I knew about so I was confused even more when I hadn't gotten a gift).
35 is next year and I'm a bit stressed that DH and I really should nail down our decision on having kids or not.
Post by sillygoosegirl on Sept 1, 2014 10:04:23 GMT -5
Three birthdays really stand out as awful:
14 - I was a couple weeks into my first year at public school after 8 years being homeschooled. We had a substitute bus driver, and some of the kids were being really roudy. The the bus driver turned around and took us back to school. I thought she was just going to abandon us at school, and I didn't know if my parents would come get me (in hindsight, both of these fears were ridiculous, but I was having a difficult time with the transition).
24 - I got into a fight with DH on my way home from work. I think the train had broken down and I wanted him to come get me so I wouldn't have to ride the whole 10 miles home on my bike. He refused. Then I got a flat tire a couple miles from home and he still didn't want to come get me. He pointed out that I had the supplies to change my tire on the bike and thought I should do that. Turns out that while I'd been able to change the tire on my mountain bike, I wasn't strong enough to do it on my new road bike. On my birthday. OMG, I was so pissed. DH did eventually come get me.
25 - my parents were visiting and I came home from work to DH and my mom having a screaming match over how to make my birthday cake. Ugh.
A lot of my birthdays between 14 and 24 were pretty lame too, but less memorably so.
After that, I started making plans to be away from home for my birthday, and started just trying to get through the day without anything awful happening. I turn 32 this month and it will be my 7th in a row away from home. That's helped a lot, I think.
22 I was in a bad hotel studying for the CPA exam until wee small hours after getting dumped by my boyfriend a few days before. I decided to get some shut eye and the people next door started banging the headboard on the adjoining wall. And the worst was that I didn't pass the bloody exam that time.
I'm not big into birthdays. I can't really think of a bad one, and I don't mind getting older. My due date for DS1 was on my 30th birthday, so turning 30 and having a kid the same week kind of shocked the system.
There was one birthday when I was in middle school that I thought my brother (away at college) forgot my bday. I was SO upset. Turns out he didn't forget, he ended up sending me something at school & had my real present when he got home that weekend. I felt awful for assuming that he had forgotten.
23 sucked, I had just moved to a new state and didn't know any once. My best friend from college was supposed to visit me, but flaked because she was scared to leave the state, and called me and told me 2 hours before she was supposed to show up (I moved 10 hours away). She later told me I was selfish for moving away.
My 30th also sucked, I was on an audit for work in the middle of nowhere.
My 30th is in 2 months. I'm completely broke in a new city. I don't have very high hopes for it. My previous few birthdays have been so much fun, since I celebrate on Halloween and I was living in a Halloween tourist town. I'm really going to miss that this year.
My H has the same problem! He's in accounting and the first week of every month is his busy time. His birthday is Dec 2nd.
My birthday is right before Thanksgiving so it's hard to get friends together nowadays because everyone is traveling to see family or family is traveling to see them. *sigh*
H and I agree we should move our birthday celebrations to July or August because the end of Nov/beginning of Dec don't work out for us very well.
25. Because I was really expecting an e-ring for my bday. Majorly disappointed, didn't even want to go out to dinner, we ended up eating a frozen pizza. ETA: we had gone tubing on the Chattahoochee earlier that day. Painfully boring. We should have brought booze.
He proposed 3 weeks later while we were on vacation which was actually much nicer than it would have been on my bday. I was just being bratty and impatient.
24. Didn't have many friends locally, didn't feel like my job was doing anything for the world, I had a bunch of things I thought I wanted to do early in life (get married, have good career growth, etc.) that weren't happening, etc.
My 21st. I had a fake ID for years beforehand, so it wasn't a big deal really. I was dating a guy named Travis. My friend Jody flew out from Missouri to celebrate with me. She ended up making out with Travis right in front of me, on the actual night of my birthday. I told her she needed to fly home earlier than planned. Drove her to the airport the next day. It sucked! And was the end of our friendship.
I actually saw her on the nest a few years ago spamming some weight loss product lol
Post by roseflower on Sept 1, 2014 13:22:33 GMT -5
I just turned 30 a couple weeks ago. It depresses me. I've not accomplished much, am dissatisfied with where I am and my husband basically forgot about it. I feel like I've wasted much of my life and I reached 30...and it sucks
Post by mrsukyankee on Sept 1, 2014 14:09:53 GMT -5
30. Not because I was turning 30 but because no one was around to celebrate with me (it was on the day after Christmas & my one friend who I was meant to hang with bailed). I do have to say that every birthday in my 40s have felt like a shock - I just don't get that I'm that old.
Post by JayhawkGirl on Sept 1, 2014 14:42:47 GMT -5
12 - my aunt got married so we were oot for that and in very "Sixteen candles" style even my parents forgot to say happy birthday for the first big part of the day.
35-grandpa died a few days before, we got home the night before from the funeral and DS had had surgery that week and still had a catheter in.
39- just a few weeks ago. Got a couple of texts, ate toast for lunch at 2pm, fixed our dinner and got a hummingbird feeder and bottle of body wash. It was very underwhelming. I'm a big birthday person, make a big deal for our family's and they usually do too (learned it from them). It's been a rough 2014 I've been busting my ass taking care of everyone while trying to tend to my own PPA. A little fuss would have been so appreciated.
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Post by FishChicks on Sept 1, 2014 15:31:34 GMT -5
30 sucked. I was in a city 1 hour from DH's office for the last day of a conference. My favorite restaurant happened to be in the city I was in. DH opted to stay at work playing Mario Cart with his team as "team building" rather than driving down to join me for dinner. I wound up driving two hours home, watching Gray's Anatomy by myself on the sofa in my PJs. I cried that night and I can count on one hand how many times I've cried as an adult. DH still hasn't lived that down with my coworkers.
My birthday is very close to Christmas. Fun birthdays have actually been exceptions, not the norm, so I think of it as a regular day. My kids get excited now so that's good.
27, last year. It was my first birthday alone. I'm a social butterfly and celebrate ups & downs with friends + family. Not having either was really, really sucky.
Not to mention, turning 27 was tough. Felt like I was really in my late 20s.