He let me down for my birthday

It looks like he finds you difficult and broke up because he doesnt know anymore how to make you happy. And is now rethinking that decision.
If i had a partner who tells me i dont do anything on my birthday, i dont like them, i would hear it as: he doesnt care about it so maybe its wise not to pay too much attention to it. I would still wish him happy b day though.
So he still promised to do something in the weekend and then remembered he also had to meet his brother. Assuming this is all true, he did everything he promised, doing something in the weekend but the day after. You then start to argue about it, and if you were my partner, this would be the part where i would get most confused: argue about the importance of a day that meant nothing to you in the first place. So its all messed up communication. Why dont you promise yourself to let go of miserable birthdays and have a blast at next yeats one. When it comes to him now: i would text him that yes you like to close the gap and have a frank talk. Not so much about the birthday but about how you two communicate and consider each other.

I think there is wrong on both your parts in this situation – without each of you meaning to.

For you — I’m all about people feeling their feelings. But you’re being way over the top for one day of the year. One of my best therapists said – the more energy you have around a thing, the less you’ve processed that thing. You have intense energy around your birthday. It’s not your boyfriend or anyone’s else job to process and learn to deal more peacefully with your past traumas. That’s work you need to do.

He was wrong in that he offered to make you feel better without checking the exact date – very dude move trying to be helpful but not managing the details. He offered to take you the cinema on the VERY next day. Next time he offers to help out —ask him to check his calendar to be sure. If he continued to do things like that it would not be okay – to not be reliable.

See a therapist to process your feelings around parties/celebrations/ birthdays. Then make a goal for next year to take a spa day, get a massage, drink alcohol, take a sedative WHATEVER it is YOU need to care for yourself for your next bday. IF anyone else, like your bf also does something nice for you, it will be a bonus.

I don’t see this relationship lasting if you hold grudges so easily. You can’t tell someone you hate birthdays, don’t celebrate them, get all emotional as to why, and then blame them for not celebrating it with you when you don’t celebrate it. Don’t you see how crazy that sounds?

I don’t care about birthdays, other than my two son’s, not because of anything negative from my past but its only an indicator of how long one has lived on this earth. That said, I wouldn’t get in a tiff or be passive aggressive with my BF just because I can’t make up my mind about it. If my BF did nothing, I would be totally OK with it simply because I truly am totally OK with it as its just another day to me. He on the other hand enjoys celebrating his Birthday, it has meaning to him so I have no qualm doing something to make it special because of the importance he puts on it. If he didn’t, and thought it was a dark bleak day, I don’t think I would want to be around him and find a way to disappear too.

I think you blowing this way out of proportion, for someone who doesn’t even like their birthday. Are you wanting him to swoop in and fix your past like a Prince on a Silver horse? If so, that’s now how to go about it; A) because men don’t think like you or other women do; and B) relying on a partner to fix what’s broken within you is not going to work, at least for long. It sounds like he’s starting to feel the weight of your past and doesn’t have the skills to help you in the way you truly need it—that’s what professionals are for.

Impossible to tell from this one situation. You need a trend

for this one situation, either you said you hate birthdays and explained why and he decided to rather give you space, you threw a tantrum, he reasonably broke up with you, felt bad the next day and tried to get you back

Or he made false promises, you were reasonably dissapointed and angry, he sent you a message threatening your security (i.e. breakup) and when you ignored it he realized his manipulation doesn’t work so he contacted you again to make up

is this an unusual situation? because if so, just let it go. If frequent however, you need to evaluate the picture as a whole

You would know in your heart whether he was being malicious i.e. knew it was your birthday, knew it was important to you that he spend it with you and decided to ditch you for his brother anyway or whether he actually believed you didn’t want to do anything for your birthday and messed up the dates. You know what kind of person he really is better than any stranger on a forum on the internet. It’s up to you to listen to your gut and ask yourself (and him again for clarity if you need to) what actually happened and what his real intentions were.

hi there gin. i can see that your situation brought you a lot of discomfort and i’m sorry that it turned into a dispute for you and your partner. birthdays can be a delicate time and some people require more support on those days. my advice to you would be to voice that as directly as possible. i’m guessing (correct me if i’m wrong) that you told your bf that you didn’t have anything planned, but internally hoped he would step up to the plate somehow. i can understand that, but your bf could have missed what you were asking for. don’t be afraid to tell him “this is a big day for me because of my past and i’d love to spend it with you because you make me feel safe or ____” now if you communicate i directly and he brushes you off, he’s not showing you he cares and that’s a problem. but be consistent with your words / desires. i think there were expectations here that weren’t met because they were misconstrued. good luck to you both.