Why January Birthdays Are The Worst (Happy Birthday To ME!)

Hello! Merry Christmas and Happy Hannukah and Happy New Year and what'd I miss? It's been awhile, sorry!
Anyway, today, as some of us just begin to let go of the holiday fugue and force ourselves back to reality, is two weeks after Christmas exactly. I know this because it is also my birthday.

So yes, the truth is birthdays in January are, in my expert opinion, the WORST. "But wait, December birthdays are also tough!" I hear you say? Sure, I give you that. Double presents and your birthday being overshadowed - I admit, that is pretty sucky. But at least in December people are in the mood to celebrate! They are pre-conditioned to be in party mode, all cares of food and drink restrictions temporarily suspended because it's Christmas.

Whereas January, I mean Veganuary/Dry January/everyone is on a dumb health kick - yeah, no one wants to have any fun anymore. They have 31 days to detox and they are so pooooor. They're so tired after the holidays, you understand, they will totally be up for drinks in a month though (which almost never happens).

To be fair this year I am not much myself in the mood to party, having been fending off a cold for two weeks now not very successfully. But still, generally speaking, January birthdays get no love. Here are just a few of the slights we suffer!

( I dream of such raucous parties as Sophie's in Peep Show! ;-))

 

 Things You Only Know if You Have a January Birthday

 

- Your birthday present (should you get one) is most likely going to be just a bit rubbish, and most likely wrapped in Christmas wrap. Chances are good it was a spur of the moment/no thought type present or maybe a re-gift. No birthday gift wrap for you, January baby! Santas and reindeer are birthday symbols to you! Most birthday presents you receive are prefixed with an "It was just Christmas you know/I didn't have time to shop...you understand though, sorry it's crap!" type disclaimer, raising your hopes absolutely sky high!

- You, however, have to smile and pretend to be delighted with any not so great birthday offerings you are lucky enough to receive, because it's super selfish of you to expect anything nice on your birthday because everyone is poor after Christmas, and your January birthday is just a pesky inconvenience, really!

-No one wants to party. A small dinner party is the best you can hope for, and most likely half the people won't turn up, because no one can be arsed leaving the house in January (as a kid this is slightly better, kids are always up for parties, to be honest my childhood wasn't too bad on this front, which set me up with unrealistic expectations for my adult birthdays being normal!).

- But you will learn to smile politely at the double Christmas birthday presents from numerous relatives as a kid, while all of your other friends and siblings (or in my case cousins) totally get real birthday presents from seemingly everyone they ever met.

- Your birthday seems enveloped with the rest of the festive season, it goes by in a fairly regularly uneventful blip. You might leave your tree up until your birthday as some sort of marker of prolonged festive cheer, but this loses its appeal eventually.

But really, I grump. The people near and dear to me do their best to avoid these January birthday tropes, and in truth as an introvert I mostly don't mind having a quieter birthday the older I get (and man....I am getting old! ;-)). I just thought I would write this for anyone else who has also suffered the indignities and also ran feeling that a January birthday can often incur. I feel your pain, fellow (mostly) Capricorns! Capricorns are known to be the grumpy old man of the zodiac sign anyway, another January perk, oh and yes, our birthstone is the rather hideous garnet, and our birthday flower is the lowly carnation*, I almost forgot. 

So yes, I put forth January as the worst possible month to have a birthday, any challengers? :-)

*I actually don't mind carnations ;-)