I don’t remember if it was when I was 18 or 19, but there was a birthday when my plan was to invite my friends over for pizzas and have a good time at home. I had communicated this very clearly to my family. The thing is that when my friends arrived at the time I told them, my family didn’t have anything ready, I asked them what was going on and they didn’t answer me. My friends, who lived far away, had to leave at dusk. It was then that my family became active, and they put me to make the pizzas, the appetizers and so on, all for them and without my consent or knowledge. Eventually my friends came to think that I didn’t want them to eat pizza or be there to celebrate, and it made me feel really bad. I think ever since then, when my family asks me what I want to do for my birthday, I say nothing, since they will still do whatever they want.

Was invited out on a Friday to celebrate my bosses birthday early since she would be out of town on her actual birthday a week later. That Friday was my actual birthday. My boss had made a point to do something for every one of her employees birthdays, so I assumed this was a ploy to get me out for my birthday. Nope.

I’ll keep it brief because I know that this kind of stuff is very triggering for some people but when I was in elementary school, my dad was an alcoholic. One year on my birthday, we decided to go out of town so we can eat at a restaurant that we didn’t have and buy some games from GameStop. Long story short, right before we reached our destination, my dad for a reason that I don’t remember (assuming there was one), decided to start physically abusing both my mom and my sister. So we ended up just going right back home and we just ordered pizza.

I learned that the lump I’d had biopsied on my neck was a pair of thyroid tumors that were suspicious for cancer, and that the whole organ would need to be removed. After pathology, it turned out not to be malignant, which is lucky, but that was a pretty unpleasant few months and now I have to take thyroid replacement hormones for the rest of my life. The doc still hasn’t got my dose quite right, so I just kind of low-key feel like shit all the time. It takes a couple months before we know if a new dosage is working better or worse. Hopefully they’ll have it figured out by my next birthday…

I got molested by my dad’s friend when I was fifteen, and my dad invited him to my sixteenth birthday a few months later. I had a temper tantrum and smashed my cake on the ground and cried all night, but to this day have never told anyone why I was so upset.