Ungrateful

[ingratitude]

NC as a bit outing.

Birthday is coming up. I loathe birthday with a passion due to family issues. I'm reconciled to this and at 40+ happy to live this way

DH thinks he has to fix this. Each year I ask for no presents or fuss. Each year he tries. Each year we fall out as I'm ungrateful for something I didn't want in the first place

This year he's taken me away - booked and paid for without my knowledge. Lovely small hotel but the nearest people in age to us are at least 25 years older and most I'd say are 80+. It's a tiny intimate hotel (nicely done) but I feel like I'm in a nursing home.

Today we're going 'out'. I asked where. Sightseeing. Sightseeing what exactly? Whatever you want he tells me. So he's booked a hotel in the middle of nowhere (no pub, restaurants etc for miles) and there's not even a plan as to how we spend our time. Hotel has no pool or anything.

AIBU to feel hugely pissed off that firstly my reasonable request was ignored not to do anything and secondly what he did then arrange is a bit shit?

I just want to go home and/or cry right now and he's gone down to breakfast without me as I'm clearly unhappy

Try to enjoy a really lovely gesture by your husband. What's not to like about a night away, restaurants, company of the person you live?

This.

The real issue is that OPs partner is persistently ignoring her request not to give her anything for her birthday. This is disrespectful. Bashing OP for being ungrateful is unhelpful. She didn’t want to be in this situation in the first place.

I understand you perfectly OP. I don't think it is ungrateful not to be grateful for something you didn't ask for and made quite clear you didn't want. My DH does this too, and it came up when we went to marriage therapy, it was good as the therapist was able to explain to my husband that booking something that I didn't like and then expecting me to be happy about it, wasn't thoughtful, it was actually quite selfish as he was just doing what he would have liked in the circumstances, and not thinking about my thoughts and needs. We discussed that someone maybe getting a present for another person and not getting it right, is a nice gesture and deserves gratitude, but in a relationship where you are supposed to understand and think about the other person, repeatedly doing stuff they don't like or need and still expecting gratitude just comes across as selfishness and thoughtfulness.

OP, you don't have to say but if birthdays bring back bad memories, have you had counselling? Easy for me or anyone else to say you are being ungrateful if we don't know full extent of your anxiety. Is your OH aware of this?

In your shoes I would have done a Google search of local area and just found something or somewhere nice and suggested it as your excursion. Your DH sounds lovely, you don’t need to make it difficult!

Or even thoughtlessness

The people who are saying "but your DH sounds lovely" are probably people who like celebrating their birthdays with a weekend away. But that's not the point. It would be like someone who loves Christmas forcing someone else who finds Christmas quite traumatic to come to theirs for a big spread and loads of presents - a lovely thing to do if they don't know any better, but if they still insisted on doing that once they'd been told "I just want to spend Christmas quietly alone doing my own thing" - at that point it becomes selfish and shows a complete lack of empathy for people who think differently to you.

I wouldn't be happy either OP. I can't believe so many PP's are saying you should be "grateful" and "he has done something nice for you", whilst ignoring the fact that he didn't listen to what you wanted.
A lot of people (me included), just don't want to "celebrate" our birthdays and to have that wish taken away from (generic) you because somebody else thinks they know what you want better than you do is really not on.

He loves you, and he wants to celebrate you. A lot of men are fairly emotionally stunted, so one of the ways he can show you he loves you is by buying stuff for you or taking you away.

Birthdays are the natural time for this, Christmas is for everyone, valentine's and wedding anniversaries are about the two of you. Without your birthday there isnt a day to celebrate you.

Birthdays don't work for you, and that is entirely reasonable, and he's a complete arse for ignoring you. But he's trying to do it out of love, and probably a need to reciprocate for any nice things you do for his birthday.

So here's my suggestion. Have an "Ingratitudes" day. Pick a random date and then every year, he has a day that he can celebrate you. It is very definitely not a birthday, there will be no cake, no singing "Happy birthday", no birthday party. But it is a day he can wait on you hand and foot, or go away, or buy you a present. Set boundaries, let him know what nice things he can do that won't make it feel like a birthday for you. Let him celebrate you, because you deserve it.

I totally get you about the not being listened to op. My exh once presented me with a bloody huge bar of Galaxy chocolate. In 8 years I had never eaten any that he had seen as I don't like it.

Apparently he thought I might have wanted some and I should have wnwn grateful..
I would have been grateful for a dh that listened to me.
Got a decent dh now though!!

I'm another one who can't believe the nastiness on this thread because you're expected to suck it up to avoid hurting a man's feeling (God forbid). This is exactly the situation I used to end up in (I've put my foot down now and get vouchers for birthday and Xmas). I'd start of hopeful that he would've listened to me, then there would be a feeling of disappointment at I realised that yet again he's either bought some generic gift/experience that "women" are supposed to like (but I personally hate) or he's booked something that he would like. But I didn't want to be ungrateful so I'd go along with it and think I'll make the best of it. And then at every corner my heart would sink a little more (crap location, nothing booking etc) and I'd realise that not only was my first instinct right but that now it's down to me to make it work, and so I would seethe inwardly until I'd make an "ungrateful" comment and he'd get all angry and hurt that he can't do anything nice. You have my every sympathy!

If your only concerns in life are that your DH wants to do something nice for your birthday you are not doing too badly….

Women who think she's ungrateful, if you booked a lovely spa weekend away for your husband's birthday, even though he'd made it clear he just wanted to watch football and go for a curry, would you think he was terribly ungrateful not to want to go on the spa weekend? Because it's a lovely thoughtful thing and you've spent money on it? If you think a man is allowed not to be over the moon when his wishes are ignored, you should extend that courtesy to women.

No presents and no fuss FOR BIRTHDAYS do make you better off if birthdays cause you great pain!

Just as if you are phobic of spiders, you are better off if people don't put spiders on you.

And there is no evidence that the OP is utterly miserable in general. BIRTHDAYS make her utterly miserable, and others should respect this by not reminding her of her birthday.

I do think that OP may not be communicating this clearly, and in particular not making it clear that her problem isn't with the details of how her birthday is acknowledged, but with having it acknowledged at all. But nobody has a duty to celebrate their birthday!

So it's ok that her DH totally ignored her wishes? That even on her birthday she is expected to go along with what HE has decided so as not to hurt his feelings, because that is what this thread is about.

What a shame , after I've just read a thread about all men hating women along comes a seemingly kind hearted and decent chap who tries (albeit clumsily) to make his wife happy. Poor bloke

That's not how I would be at all. I hate my birthday and refuse all recognition of it. I absolutely don't want a fuss and for anyone to feel miserable or tiptoe round me, I just want anyone who knows the date to forget it and treat it as any other day.

Fortunately my DH totally gets and respects that. He doesn't try to strong arm me into having a weekend away or any other celebration hecuase unlike OP's DH he doesn't see me as needing to be fixed.

OP I'm sorry you're having a shit time. You've agreed to something you didn't want to try and make someone else happy on your birthday. Been there. It sucks. I've put my foot down now and don't get any of this anymore.

but it apparently has no restaurants or anything for miles (bar one assumes the hotel restaurant, which could be fairly okay or just bland).

it sounds like a long drive to maybe a local village pub?

Seemingly kind hearted and decent. He ignores her wishes every year. Do you not think if he was kind hearted and decent he would actually listen to her?

Ah Op-know your place.

Does as you are told by the man who knows better & it'll all be fine.
🙄

Or tell him-will he ever just fucking well listen to you!

I don't think it's a lovely gesture at all.

It would be like my husband arranging a diving weekend for me even though he knows I hate going on boats.

It's hardly lovely to make someone do something you know they hate.

If this is the only area your husband is an arse OP, I'd have another chat with him and explain why you hate birthdays and that you can see he wants to make you happy (if you do see that that is) but that forcing you to celebrate your birthday is actually making you very unhappy. And that the fact that he knows this is even more upsetting when he continues to deliberately upset you.

I'd say if he doesn't respect your wishes and feelings next year, I'd be planning to go away without him every year around my birthday so he can't continue to make me unhappy.

It's hard trying to please a birthday misery guts. You obviously do care a great deal about your birthdays otherwise you wouldn't be behaving like a birthday diva.
It really isn't. It's the easiest thing in the world to please me on my birthday by forgetting it. I care immensely about it if I am forced to acknowledge it in any way. If you completely ignore it happy days.

I agree with your first paragraph. But birthdays ARE just about you (unlike, say, Christmas which is a general holiday, and a particularly special day for children), and people who hate their birthday should NOT be forced to acknowledge it. If you truly want to celebrate someone else, then the most important thing is to accept their own wishes and phobias, and not force them to do things that cause them pain.

It's not quite clear to me whether your husband expects birthday greetings, etc. but is in a foul mood with everyone on the day; or whether he asks that his birthday be ignored, and gets cross when his wishes are not respected. If the former, I agree that his behaviour is unfair, and that he should accept his birthday graciously or not at all. But if his choice is 'not at all', then this should be accepted. The kids can be shown that respecting someone else's phobias is the best present of all. And that not everyone celebrates the same things- after all, they probably know people who ignore Christmas in favour of Eid or Hanukkah or Diwali. No doubt some other occasion could be found to give their dad pressies and/or a cake - Father's Day perhaps; or perhaps just some randomly chosen day in the calendar.

So, do you never go away at any other time? Why not just concentrate on a nice break away. I'm assuming you're in the UK, so, honestly, you can't be that far from somewhere nice to go, it's not like you're in the middle of the Gobi Desert.

Your dislike of birthdays due to historical family issues is understandable but perhaps it would be a nice thing to create your own birthday traditions with your DH - we do very low key birthdays, meal out or maybe a night away if we can afford it, no presents because we don't need more 'stuff' and certainly no parties.

Ditto!