I Wish I Could Just Happily Await Birthday Celebrations

I really do…….

But I can’t. I am an actual crazy person leading up to my birthday.

My daughter’s birthday is just six days before mine.  And I love it. Planning for her birthday makes me happy.

See, to me birthday’s are meant to be a big deal.  Every other holiday belongs to every person. But on your birthday it feels awesome to have people acknowledge that they are grateful that you exist.  And that’s really what it is, I want to feel like those close to me are grateful for my existence in their lives.

Unfortunately there have been some years where the people closest to me have really dropped the ball.  I mean flat out forgetting to acknowledge my birthday or much worse, intentionally deciding that since my birthday is so close to my daughter’s I no longer needed any acknowledgement. WHAT???? That is just cruel, I may be an adult and a mother but that doesn’t mean I don’t still have feelings, even some pretty petty ones.

And this year I happened to still be emotionally recovering from six months of chronic face pain, as well as adjusting to new medication.  Add in that I am weaning off one of my antidepressants and the mood stabilizer that I have been taking daily for two years.  It was not pretty.  I started freaking out the day after my daughter’s birthday,interesting that was also the day I got the diagnosis of Trigeminal Neuralgia.  Things weren’t looking good, and of course we had cancellations of plans (every frigging year).

Then came my Eureka moment

I sometimes struggle to find to find my physical voice when I’m not sure how what I’m thinking/feeling will be received.  I don’t however lose my ability to have these feelings in the first place, so I still need to do something about them.  Here is where the written word comes in so handy.

And actually writing didn’t occur to me naturally,  because I didn’t write well. 

As I got older and recognized how important writing well would be if I wanted to move beyond serving and retail jobs.  I enjoyed those jobs but after becoming a mother I wanted something more stable, insert insane laughter because of how that worked out.  As my written language improved I realized that writing allowed me to compose my feelings. Writing about it allows me to actually see what I’m working with.  And some of it, once I see it, I realize that it’s not really the big deal I was imagining.

It also allows me to compose an email, this comes in handy when I’m dealing with my husband.  He is so caring but he is also away more than he is home, so email and text are a big part of our daily communication. Once he’s done work for the day the kids are home from school so phone calls don’t have the luxury of being private.

So I wrote an email about all my birthday feelings.  Where they stem from and things that have amplified them.  Past birthdays are done, so they are fact now and can’t be changed.  I finally realized that they just needed to be forgiven so I could move forward.  It also opened up some honest communication about the aspects we were seeing from entirely different angles.   Wow, this was some major stuff for me.

Dinner with my lovely mother

It just so happened that my mom was in town for my birthday weekend and we were both available to have dinner just the two of us.  It had been so long since we had done that.  I figured that with my birthday issues behind me we would just enjoy a quiet kid free dinner.  Except I’m still my mom’s baby and having her as a captive audience was long overdue.

I broke down and cried and then cried so much more.  My mom is a special woman and being with her while not having to wear all of my masks (mother, wife, sister) I got to just release it all. Everything that I had been hiding and holding came out in a powerful wave.

T-minus 1 Day

It’s party day.

I start by getting my hair done.  Then we had our children and five of their friends swimming in the hotel pool.  I did not swim due to the hair being freshly done, but I manned the hot tub while my husband handled the pool.  It was a blast.

We had another cancellation and I was okay.

After all the friends were picked up we left our little people at the hotel with grandma. We went home to get ready for a fancy Keg dinner with A friend because that’s all we had left.  But I was okay. In my week of crying and writing I realized something very important.  Every other time of the year I am beyond grateful for the people in my life.  I have so much support and love.  And I have been working so hard on loving myself.  So why would I let one day carry so much weigh.  In past years those cancellations would have destroyed me even though every single one was totally legitimate.   But this year I felt okay.  And wouldn’t you know it, two friends became available to join us.  It was a delicious dinner that I loved, it paired nicely with all the wine we drank.  After dinner at the pub we found two more friends.  I had a frigging blast.

And it’s birthday time

I got to shop, see my mom and then shop some more.  I got books and paints, if you’re interested.  And we had some quiet time. Then after dinner, Cory and the kids brought up balloons for me (balloons are a big deal at our house) and a special gluten free white cake he had ordered for me.  I also got to open more art supplies and a gift card to Michaels.  It was perfect.

Huge Thank-yous

To Cory, my love, for dealing with me and my crazy every year.  Here’s to hoping they go a little more smoothly in the future.

To my Mom for being here with me, and for listening in a way only you can do.

To my lovelies, Margo and Atticus, for your unwavering affection and love even on the bad days.

To my circle, thank-you to all of you who make me feel like my existence is important all year round.

xoxo

As Always Alice