What time of the year do you find most difficult?

Me too for all the reasons you've listed!

This time of year. This exact time. Summer is gone. The days are getting shorter. It's dark, it's colder, it's wet. The bright lights of Christmas aren't even here yet to cheer us up. Plus something awful happened to me at this time of year, and as weird as it sounds, those feelings come back very easily when the weather reminds me.

I know January is darker and colder, but at least the days are getting longer again by that point, and the hope for summer and spring keeps me going.

Agree October to January - dislike festive period since my Mum died and I have very few relations left in this country, in February days lengthen and birdsong begins.

Really prefer April-May when everything is growing / singing / bursting into leaf and bloom but before you get too hot and bitten alive by ticks/midges etc and too many people about.

It's horrible isn't

My mum died the week before Christmas, and opening presents from her on Christmas day felt so sad and final.

This time of the year. Pretty much only because I have 2 large, long haired dogs. It’s just the clean up that is needed post walks, post going into the garden etc. And so much more paraphernalia needed for walks - torch, gloves, jacket. Pain in the arse!

I’m a clean freak so I have 5/6 months of daily steam cleaning, flash mopping and vacuuming ahead of me. Plus the muddy towels. So many towels.

Luckily my boys can melt my heart with just a look!

Jan and Feb. I enjoy the cold but by the new year it just starts the drag. There’s nothing to look forward too until summer holiday and Christmas is behind you. They’re long months.

Thanks. I'll polish my halo 🤣

My father died just before Christmas. He had already chosen my presents, wrapped them and written their labels. Although it is many years ago, I still feel bereft during the Christmas period.

You would think we lived in the tropics wouldn't you @tobee

Ha! The first two replies on this thread are absolutely peak Mumsnet.

😃😃😃😃

Press x

(And I do have more than one night out a year. My DH is perfectly capable of looking after the children while I go out with friends. I just only have one night out alone with DH a year, as I wrote in my post, because we don’t have many other childcare options).

Wow, something has upset you disproportionately.
Im sitting in the hospital this morning waiting for DSs monthly check up. Gives me a bit of time to check MN.

WTAF???

I love my birthday 😊. We have three kids and one is quite severely disabled. We also both work full time. Life is a constant struggle of work, medical appointments, therapy appointments, admin related to disability, trying to give our other 2 children as normal a life as possible, etc etc. Having a disabled child is also expensive so buying things for ourselves is rare, and on top of that we have very limited options for childcare. My birthday is the one time that I feel like I can take a bit of time for myself, ask for an evening’s childcare so we can go out etc. It’s generally the only evening that DH and I go out alone together all year (his birthday is Christmas Day so we can’t do it then). So I’m happy to be ‘frankly immature’ and don’t want to ‘grow the fuck up’.

Not me, village in SE. It absolutely gets too hot at times in the summer (only a few days this year fortunately) and I like my wellies!

I think all the summer haters and winter lovers must live in towns or cities where it gets too hot in summer and they don't have to deal with mud in winter.

Where I live there are no pavements between villages and not many mud free places to walk in wet weather.

I had to be really clear. After my polite requests to have it ignored were taken to mean that I didn't really mean ignored but just meant lowkey I sent one text that explained that ignore means ignore. That not listening to that very simple request hurt me, made me feel completely undermined and caused me stress and upset. You either ignore it entirely or you make me sad and miserable. That's the choice.

It worked. It was politely worded still but entirely clear about the impact in a way I maybe hadn't been before.

It's my birthday this Sunday. I'll be turning 45.

I don't detest my birthday, that's too strong of a word, I've just never seen it as a big deal.
As a kid sure, it was fun, presents and a party.
But as an adult? I find it a bit odd that grown people would still get excited about it tbh.

I don't want presents, I'm a fully grown adult, if I want something, I'll buy it whenever i choose or when I have the funds to do so.

I don't want a party, I'm a fully grown adult, if I want to get pissed, I'll do so whenever i want and don't need to use any particular date, sport, event as justification to do so.

I don't want a meal out, I'm a fully grown adult, if I want a meal out, I'll have one in places i like to go to... Like Pizza Hut or the cheapest carvery I can find.

And I really really have zero interest in putting in a shit ton of effort to get dressed up and go out to town and end up in some grotty shit hole surrounded by piss head wankers and pissed women in too little clothing.

So I don't detest my birthday, I'm indifferent and find the weird obsession other adults have with theirs to be frankly immature and they should grow the fuck up. (I'm a fun person, can you tell...)

Oh my god, yes. 'But you must celebrate it', 'You don't really mean it', 'Of course you want to do something special'.

I don't mind getting older and birthdays when I was a child were fun, it's just that I hate a fuss and really I don't want much these days. I don't hate it, it's just another day. I wish people would believe me!

In my case, mainly because I HATE having attention focused on my reaching a new age. This is partly due to fear of ageing, deterioration in health, etc.; but mainly goes back to childhood, when my unrecognized dyspraxia was often regarded as babyishness and 'Why can't you do this at your age?' Even more generally, all the emphasis on 'Now you're 6!'; 'Now you're 7!' made me feel almost as though I'd become/ was expected to become a different person. As an adult, my hatred of birthdays has been increased by people who act as though I'm playing some sort of coy game, and insist on disregarding my wishes.

As a dog owner the mud is what really sends me over the edge 😩

Mud season. Gloomy, dull, damp mud season.

Life is just easier when it's light and dry. Bonus points for warm months when you don't have to continuously adjust layers.

November and January are bleurgh waiting months of gloom.