He forgot my birthday


Home Forums How To Get My Ex Back He forgot my birthday

Viewing 21 posts - 1 through 21 (of 21 total)
  • Author
    Posts
  • #523021 Reply
    Marie

    So my ex initiated contact and we have been talking normally for a couple of days now. I talk a lot and I’ve been the one initiating contact all the time. He does answer me all the time and he does seem eager to talk to me. So today, I didn’t have any access to WiFi and didn’t message him all day. I came home expecting at least a message from him there was none. But he told me he was busy. My birthday is on Monday. His birthday is a couple of days after mine. I wanted to test him to see if he cared about me enough to remember my birthday. If he cares about me, whenever he remembers his birthday he should also remember mine because they’re so close. And even during our relationship I was rigorously making plans for our birthdays. SO he knows that it’s something very important to me. I even dropped a hint and asked him what he wants to do for his birthday. So, I decided to go easy on him. I told him “For my birthday, I want a box of strawberries!”. I know I would be very sad if he didn’t wish me happy birthday so I came out and directly reminded him that my birthday was coming up and even told him what to buy. He told me “I don’t even remember when your birthday is.” I was extremely hurt. I know the day his birthday is and now that we’re talking I was even making plans in my head about what we should do. I told him something along the lines of I guess I’m not that important to you. He said “A day can’t go by when I don’t do something wrong. Enjoy your evening.” I got even more upset. It already hurts that he forgot my birthday now he’s trying to be the victim. This always happens. Whenever I’m upset, he never apologizes or tries to understand my feelings. He just gets upset and then the one who has to apologize is me. I told him all of this and he sends a long paragraph starting with “How can you want me to apologize? You want me to apologize for forgetting your birthday? Lol”. And to summarize, in his paragraph he basically said that we’ve been through a lot and I should be content that we’re even talking. I think he was hurt when I was questioning my importance to him but he doesn’t even say that I’m important to him or anything. He just gets mad. I sent him a long paragraph about my feelings which he ignored and a couple of hours later I told him goodbye.

    It already hurt that he forgot my birthday but he think he’s sooo justified he doesn’t want to apologize. I’m not going to contact him anymore. But I’ve just been wondering, am I overreacting?

    #523027 Reply
    Pamela

    No you are not over reacting. He is your ex for a reason. You sound like you are still hung up on this guy, his actions shows a lack of interest, leave him alone, don’t force someone to think of you or be with you when it’s obvious they don’t want to be.

    The fact that you talk a lot, and has been the one initiating contact says a lot, don’t lose your dignity over this guy, he sounds like a jerk in my opinion.

    He is no longer your boyfriend, so I guess he does not owe you anything. I know how hurt you must be feeling, but the sooner you realize he is not the guy for you, the sooner you can move forward and begin to heal.

    Stick with your decision of No contact, soon he will only be a distant memory

    #523029 Reply
    Hannah

    Massively. You were playing games. You wanted to test him. Games quite often backfire! You decided it was important and showed he cared if he remembered your birthday. Why? Why does that show he cares? What if he’s bad with dates? Then you got upset because he hadn’t met your test.

    The guy is just trying to go through life and now yyou’ve worked you way into being upset about an imagined standard he knew nothing about. Now you’re sending him paragraphs about your feelings?! All because he didn’t remember q date and you decided to attach importantly to it. Thats not fair on him. If these things happen all the time, I’m not surprised he feels he’s aways doing something wrong. Carry on playing games and he’ll get fed up eventually.

    #523034 Reply
    Marie

    @Hannah I wasn’t playing games. I was just going to not tell him anything on my birthday and when the day comes, if he doesn’t remember I’ll go back to doing NC. I figured that if I was important to him he would remember my birthday like I remember his. But, like you said he could just be forgetful. So I reminded him that my birthday was coming up with the message about the strawberries. But he didn’t even remember the date. I mean, I can understand forgetting but the date too? Especially when our birthdays are so close to each other.

    @Pamela you are right. I can’t force him to care. I was just ignoring the signs that he doesn’t care.

    #523042 Reply
    Emily

    Yes, you’re overreacting and here’s why. By “testing” this guy, you are indeed playing games with him. People who play with fire get burned, as the saying goes. This is a good lesson in the importance of 1. not trying to manipulate other people into behaving a certain way and 2. why an ex is an ex for a reason. Lesson going forward: don’t test men, and don’t try to get back together with an ex.

    #523064 Reply
    Marie

    How am I overreacting? How would you feel if your guy didn’t just forget your birthday, he forgot the date. And to make things worse he refuses to say “I’m sorry.”

    #523065 Reply
    Nellie

    But he’s not your guy anymore.

    #523068 Reply
    lovelybee

    this is ridiculous…stop talking to your ex. don’t get worked up over someone who is in the past…not worth it.

    #523114 Reply
    Hannah

    Marie, wanting to test him and this… “I was just going to not tell him anything on my birthday and when the day comes, if he doesn’t remember I’ll go back to doing NC”..is playing games. Not playing games would have been to say it’s my birthday on Monday. End of drama.

    What about his feelings? You were just not going to tell him something and then ignore him if he didn’t spontaneously remember it? That’s not fair on him.

    Also “I figured that if I was important to him he would remember my birthday” isn’t fair on him. Just because you remember something doesn’t mean he should or it means anything other than he forgot if he didn’t remember it. You’re projecting your thoughts and feelings on to him immediately assuming it means he didn’t care. My husband wouldn’t remember our wedding anniversary but I don’t automatically get upset and think he doesn’t care. He’s just forgotten. So, to save any drama and upset, I remind him a week before.

    I don’t think he’s done anything he needs to say sorry for. He forgot a date. That’s human nature.

    This “I was even making plans in my head about what we should do” is dangerous thinking BTW! I’ve done it too. You don’t mention anything to the other person but have a whole scenario mapped out in your head. When it doesn’t work like you imagined it, you get upset and disappointed. But the other person had no idea you even had plans! It’s a lot easier for the relationship to live in the present and not try to control the future.

    Well, you told him goodbye and I think that was the best option. I can’t see this working between you.

    #523116 Reply
    Tallspicy

    You initiating contact = he is your ex and not interested

    Him not remembering your birthday = still your ex.

    He is your ex. If he wanted something different, he would be the one doing the work.

    #523117 Reply
    redcurleysue

    The birthday is not really the issue. He feels that there is a STACK of things you do not like about him.

    That is the real problem….if I were with a guy and a lot of the time he complained about me I would wonder why I was staying with him…or him with me for that matter….

    So look at the real issue here….a lot of criticism. Remember a man wants to make a woman happy mainly….not sad.

    #523123 Reply
    Amy S

    Hi. It sounds like you are way too over invested in this guy and what hes doing. You are the one initiating contact and fussing over things he does and says, he must be wondering what on earth you want from him. Hes clearly not interested and if he was he would be making an effort to win you back. Sorry to say you should give him and yourself too a break and cut all contact with this guy. As it stands all you are doing is prolonging the pain and preventing the healing and making yourself look needy and desperate in his eyes too. If theres anything to salvage with this guy it can only be after he has had to face life without you in it so do this now. Good luck. x

    #532288 Reply
    Jessica

    Any update? I’m guessing you felt very ganged up on by the replies in this thread but you do need a reality check. I had a very similar experience which I will get into later in this post…

    I think you set yourself up for failure by getting mad at him for saying he doesn’t remember the date of your birthday. That probably made him feel like he can’t make you happy, and like if he did make an effort for your birthday now, it would be because you basically told him he had to do so. It made him feel like “screw it” when it comes to your birthday. Men don’t like being told what to do. How did you expect him to react to you getting mad? Apologize? You can’t help if you forgot something, people do not forget on purpose, they don’t have control over forgetting. It sounds like you just wanted him to say “oh I’m so sorry I’m such a jerk for not remembering when your birthday is, forgive me!” which is really not healthy and, again, he shouldn’t really feel that way because he didn’t MAKE himself forget your birthday. He initiated you guys getting back in touch but I think your mistake was coming on too strong as you said now you are the one always initiating the contact. Now you seem needy. You should have waited it out and see if he continues initiating contact to get a real sense of how interested he is now, instead you got so excited about him getting back in touch that you are acting as if you are in a relationship again, reaching out to him all the time. Sounds like he was just starting to test the waters and you are already back to thinking it’s a relationship, expecting to celebrate your birthdays together, etc.

    A better approach would have been to just remind him instead of getting mad, like, “My birthday is on ____ , remember, our birthdays are __ days apart.” Then he would know when your birthday is and you could see if he puts in any effort for your birthday. Instead you got mad, making him lose interest because you seem needy. You are his ex and he forgot your birthday – you are his EX and you guys are back in contact trying to figure things out again – I think you are forgetting that you guys are exes. Exes need to start over. That may include being reminded when your birthday is. I hope you aren’t expecting him to remember important past anniversaries and sentimental dates like that too, because again, you need to start over, start NEW again. You still see him as “your guy” as you called him but you need to get to that point again and you’re not there. He would probably feel weird you think of him as “your guy” when you guys are just starting to text again.

    I don’t mean to sound harsh, trust me I’ve been there. I’ve unfortunately stayed in a similar situation for YEARS now with an on-and-off ex. His bday is exactly one week after mine. It’s almost 4 years now since we first started dating. Things really started going downhill after the first year and a half but I just dragged it out because he was my first everything and I wanted that fairytale of it working out with the first guy. The second year we were together, he forgot my birthday. Here’s how that went down… For several months leading up to my birthday he seemed to be losing interest (or “I’m just so busy” as he would say). After a couple months of being the only one making an effort, I did no-contact for a full calendar month, didn’t hear from him at all. Then I casually texted him about something funny I had seen that reminded me of a TV show we both watch. Anyway he started initiating texting me after that, seemed like he was happy I got back in touch, that I wasn’t mad and the door was still open. He also seemed curious if I was meeting other guys and a bit needy when I didn’t respond within minutes when he texted me back (asking “are you busy?”)

    Anyway, he forgot my birthday a month after we started texting again after my no-contact. He had just texted me and started a conversation several days before. I let him know he forgot my birthday once it was like 9:30pm and no birthday message from him. I just texted him “guess what today is” with some birthday symbols, and he immediately texted back, apologized and expressed feeling very sorry and that he had been super busy with work lately, and asked what I did for my birthday. I figured he forgot because we were no longer friends on Facebook and I know guys (and just many people in general) are not always good with important dates, most people only remember someone’s bday these days thanks to Facebook! I was pretty much EXPECTING him to forget because I knew Facebook wouldn’t remind him. Anyway he made immediate plans to take me out for my birthday and we did go out, although in retrospect I shouldn’t have made myself so available to him, that has been my problem all along, he so rarely has time for me that I feel like I *NEED* to say yes whenever he is available or else we would never see each other but obviously someone isn’t going to value your time if you are just always available at their convenience, and this is all very one-sided with me making all the effort. The next year (last year) he DID remember my birthday, I’m guessing forgetting it the first time he probably then put it in his calendar so he doesn’t forget again, or maybe just the fact that I mentioned my birthday coming up helped him remember, the year of the no-contact month I made no mention of my birthday coming up at all when we started texting again.

    Anyway, I think you should just forget about him, clearly you do not make each other happy. He is a jerk for n basically telling you that you’re lucky he is even talking to you since he is the one who initiated contact in the first place. Clearly he just sees you as an option that he wants to keep open as long as there is very, very little effort required, but you are not willing to settle for that – good for you! Maybe now you can see that you did overreact, but only because you should know better than to have such expectations from a guy who is clearly not that interested – he is just stringing you along, don’t let him fool you. You could have reacted calmly like I did and maybe then he would have wished you a happy birthday or even taken you out but I still don’t think it would have met your expectations. You two are just not on the same page. Try to move on so you are not dealing with the same crap on your next birthday. Plan something fun for your next birthday that doesn’t involve having expectations of any man to be happy.

    #631739 Reply
    Crysti

    A man who is interested in a woman will not forget the things important to her. The better question to ask here is why is he ok with not spending a special day, her day with her? Granted, if you are not actually dating, if you are not currently in some type of relationship with each other, then you can’t hold him to an unrealistic expectation.

    Men will always, always pursue what they want. Do you really want a guy who can’t manage to remember your birthday? A guy who doesn’t contact you enough to ask if you even want to spend time with him on your birthday? I think the honest answer is, no.

    For all the ladies who accept men have a hard time with dates… that’s an excuse for their behavior. How many times have you told a guy you were dating that something important was coming up soon. Or that you were doing such and such on a certain day next week…and they remembered to ask you…without you even bringing it up? They remembered it because it shows they were listening to you, which makes you feel like you are important to them. How many men who forget a special day to woman, but don’t forget about a business meeting two weeks from now? Men DO NOT FORGET THINGS IMPORTANT TO THEM.

    So when a guy chooses to not spend a holiday with you, chooses to not spend your birthday with you, chooses to not spend time with you…he is showing you that you are not important to him. Move on and find a man who wants to spend those special moments of life with you, not apologizing because he forgot them.

    #631742 Reply
    Amz

    You got your hopes up over an ex that you probably shouldn’t even be in contact with. It sucks, but this is why NC is sooooooo important! Go back to it and stay there. Break-ups happen for a reason. Respect those reasons and look after yourself and heal, move on.

    #631746 Reply
    Crisula

    jeez woman

    he’s your ex.. you’ve only been talking for a couple of days and you’re already testing and smothering the guy

    He’s not hurt, he’s just tired of your bs

    I don’t blame him

    #631752 Reply
    Vanessa

    YEAR OLD POST.

    #649424 Reply
    Leo

    A year-old post, okay! But something similar happening here, except that it’s my birthday today and I expected him to gimme a call at sharp 12 because almost every night we’re on the phone talking about nothing or just joking (this is an LDR) and I think I told him too many times directly and indirectly that my birthday really means a lot to me. Off late things aren’t going great but he at least calls at night before going to bed.

    In my case, he apologises very easily, but the problem is he never means his “sorry” because he’d repeatedly break promises. And if I tell him that he needn’t apologize because he’d not change anyway, he makes himself the victim and justifies himself so well that anyone listening to his justification would think I’m cruel! That’s what happened yesterday.

    A few days ago, he made a strange statement saying “buy yourself anything but that (something I really like a lot) because it’ll soon reach you, on time!”. I didn’t know how to respond. In his family, there have always been too many issues, so nobody including him has ever celebrated a birthday. I was the one to introduce the concept of surprise gifts for him this year for his birthday. So has he planned a surprise for me? He was even joking, asking me, “I’ve marked this day on my calendar. You know what it is?” a few days ago. So he surely does know my birthday, but why’s he not called today?

    He is going through some financial difficulties and problems with work, but who doesn’t have problems? I’m tired of his hot and cold. I’ll wait till this day comes to an end. I’ll know. Feeling bad. Just needed to vent out!

    #649425 Reply
    Jen

    It is SO ANNOYING when someone posts under an old post. Do a new post.

    #649468 Reply
    Leo

    Thanks a lot, Jen! You seem to be adorable! I have mentioned that I just needed to vent out! If someone kind comes across this, let them say something sweet. If people like you come across this, WHY CAN’T YOU MIND YOUR OWN BUSINESS?

    #649472 Reply
    Hannah

    So you know he consistently breaks promises and doesn’t mean what he says?

    Did he surprise you for your birthday or did you get what you expected…nothing?

    I’ll definitely say something sweet if he didn’t let you down again.

Viewing 21 posts - 1 through 21 (of 21 total)
Reply To: He forgot my birthday
Your information:





<blockquote> <code> <pre> <em> <strong> <ul> <ol start=""> <li>