Today is November 7th. Three full days after I celebrated my November 4th birthday I still have not gotten any text or phone call from my parents, brother, or my two children. I realize that I am an adult. I told myself over and over again that it was just another day. All my life I was told “a birthday is just another day.” I believed hoping for birthday wishes was selfish and to just move on.

My sponsor from the program in the early 2000s tried to teach me the importance of a person’s birthday. He ALWAYS made sure I knew I was important to him on MY birthday. His birthday was just a month later and I remember he always invited me to his birthday celebrations. He would invite lots of people and I remember his birthdays fondly. However, to avoid the hurt and sadness on my birthday I would still say it was just another day.

After I dropped out of SA in 2006, I was able to ignore my birthday again. My parents and kids would not text or call. I would use sex, porn, and masturbation to numb out the pain. I was good once again. I could deal with it being just another day.

In 2009 I met a woman, now my wife, who told me that my birthday was important. I tried to stop my compulsive behaviors without a program. No matter how hard I tried to keep my double life secret, I would spiral down from the hurt and pain of my birthday. Today I am convinced that my birthday is the biggest trigger I have because it is not just another day, no matter how much I try to tell myself that. In my self-pity I downplayed my birthday, and even my existence. I didn’t matter, nobody cared, nobody wanted me. In order to matter I sought someone outside myself (usually multiple someones) to tell me I do matter, that someone cared, and that I am wanted.

Today all that is different. I am on Step 9 for the first time in my life. I am able to look at my parents, children, and brother as sick people just like I am. I am able to look at my life and realize I have forgotten SO many birthdays and events (my second anniversary) because I was so wrapped up in me. Alcoholics Anonymous says, “Driven by a hundred forms of fear, self-delusion, self-seeking, and self-pity, we step on the toes of our fellows and they retaliate. Sometimes they hurt us, seemingly without provocation, but we invariably find that at some time in the past we have made decisions based on self which later placed us in a position to be hurt.” (p. 62)

Today, because of SA and working the Steps, I can clearly see that I have done things to put myself in this position. However, I can do things to make my life better. I have gone through my contacts and made sure that every person I care about has a birthday that will alert me. They will get a Happy Birthday from me. I make it a point to remember my anniversary as well. I can never make up for the one I forgot, but I can be sure to not let that mistake happen again. Today with the help of my sponsor and the SA program I know that my birthday is important. I know that I matter and that others care. So even though I struggle with the hurt, I know that there are those that do care that I was born on November 4th, 1973!