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I've realized a lot of my problems stem from my family. Whether that be how they treat me or mental illnesses passed now, they definitely have impacted me. I'm coming up on my birthday in the next few weeks and I don't really want it to be here. I don't want anyone to bring it up for a number of reasons. My family always forgot my birthday when I was little. Telling a five year old "I totally forgot you birthday was coming up!" hurts their feelings. Especially when it becomes an annual tradition. It also doesn't help when you take the kid to get her birthday card. Like I know you are stuck with me, you don't have to remind me. Want me to just read it now so you don't have to buy it? Yes, I actually did that one year. They didn't buy the card, by the way. My boyfriend says that my birthday is really important to him and maybe it is, but I don't want it to be. His parents got me a cake and everything. I didn't know they remembered and cried. Needless to say, everyone was shocked when I cried over a birthday cake. I just want it to disappear. All my friends know I hate my birthday and they still want to celebrate it. I don't understand it. Yes, they might care, but if they truly did, they would know I don't want they to. It just makes me feel bad. My parents always made my birthday seem like a chore, so i don't want to make it seem like a chore for my friends. Its just easier if I pretend it doesn't exist. So here I am, sitting on my floor, crying about my birthday. The one week of my life I hate. You'd never expect it if you see me every other day of the year. This is only one way my family has screwed me over. I just remembered the time my brother was yelling at me as we were playing a video game. I understood why he was yelling at me, so I wasn't upset. I made his angry, it only made sense, I mean that's what everyone else did when I upset them. My dad then yelled at my brother for yelling at me (makes sense, right?) and I tried to stick up for my brother, but got yelled at myself. Now I flinch every time someone raises their voice and I will always assume something is wrong with me. I just don't know what to do anymore.
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Wow I’m really sorry that you’ve been through that. Family issues are one of the most painful things to go through.
I guess I’ve been through something similar, however, I finally moved past it.
About a year ago, I was struggling with a couple of things, especially my mental health, and I came across Buddhism. People always tend to get scared when you start talking about religion lol but my point is Buddhism taught me something incredibly valuable.
It was about letting go of all your attachments. Attachments are the main cause of pain; everything comes to an end eventually and strongly holding onto it even after it’s gone can be so unhealthy.
For example, let’s say a child gets a toy for Christmas but eventually, the toy breaks and they have to throw it away. If you don’t emotionally let go of the toy, you’ll just be left miserable.
You can substitute/ apply the the toy in the example for whatever fits your situation like: other physical objects, people, ideas/ expectations, etc.
And in your case, you seem to be holding onto this trauma you experienced years ago. Although it’s probably a prominent memory, it’s only hurting you to keep looking back on it. So let go of the past where your family would forget your birthday and live in the present where your boyfriends parents get you a cake and your friends chose to celebrate it with you.
Replace your old memory of your birthday with a new one; you found set up a new tradition like every year, save up money to buy yourself something special on your birthday; or every year, go out to the same place with your friends and celebrate your birthday by doing whatever you like best.
But you could also just remove any significance of your birthday if you want because technically it is just another day on this planet, you’re just a year older. Personally I don’t like my birthday and prefer to use the new year to realize how far I’ve come since last time. But go with whatever works best for you.
It’s okay if you go through all of this and then look back on the memory and it makes you feel weird, it’s natural, but remember you no longer have to go through that because you are in a different place now with different people.
I wish you the best of luck with getting past this, and happy early birthday
:)
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