I love birthdays! I love celebrating the fact that my children, my family, or my friends, have made it another year around the sun!
I love birthdays – except my own.
I don’t like being the center of attention, but I like making others feel that way. This has been my go-to mode for a while. I didn’t feel like this when I was younger, though. I loved having a day to celebrate my accomplishment of getting a year older.
I feel for me, it culminated after turning 21. I had already celebrated the accomplishments of turning the big 1-0 (double digits – that’s a big deal!), 16 and being able to drive, 18 and being a true adult, and 21 where almost everything is legal. On my 22nd birthday, I had these big expectations of having the same joy, happiness, and uniqueness that previous birthdays had brought.
But it didn’t happen.
Now looking back on it, that was an immature way of thinking. At the same time, I was 22, and not many people are mature at 22 years old.
It wasn’t until I went to celebrate my 25th birthday, when I was pregnant with my twins, that I truly did not want my birthday to be about me anymore. It was that day that I really felt like it was just another day.
What was even better was that I was really OK about it.
I had two growing people inside of me who had all the birthdays – including their true birth date – ahead of me. I knew I wanted to make each birthday, whatever that day was to be, to be the most special day every year.
Now that some time has passed, and I now have three children, those feelings haven’t changed. My children’s birthdays are a huge deal for me. I love celebrating the fact that they are older, have so much life ahead of them, and that they get a day to celebrate everything about them.
I also love celebrating family and friends’ birthdays. I recognize it’s an odd thing, but I do not like telling my good friends, “Happy birthday” on social media outlets. If I want to make someone feel special, I will call or send them a text message with a happy birthday greeting because at the end of the day, if someone wants to make me feel important on my birthday, that’s how I would want to be contacted.
But do I want to make my birthday a big deal? Nope. Let it be another day.
As moms, we put our children before ourselves for so many things. For me, one of those things includes birthdays. And for me, that’s the best birthday present I can give myself.
