Confession: I really, really don't like my birthday.

Today is my birthday and, well, I do not like my birthday.

I know. It’s sacrilegious.

Birthdays are a time for presents! For cake! For Facebook wall posts from your distant relatives who live overseas and people you played netball with when you were 11! This is not a time to be a kill joy, but to be happy and grateful, stupid face!

I get it. I’m the total worst, yet still, I do not like my birthday.

And believe me, it goes far beyond the Happy Birthday song (although I do feel like a very wrinkly, very small sultana when people sing me the Happy Birthday song).

Let me explain.

In the lead up to my birthday, every fu-juck-ing year, I feel crippling anxiety about three things:

Anxiety inducing thing one: For an entire day, the attention is going to be on me. ALL OF THE ATTENTION is going to be on me. As someone who considers herself to be more like an awkward giraffe than a functioning human, this is not ideal.

This morning, when a friend called to wish me a happy birthday, I responded “You too!”, to which she said, “But my birthday is in October… you were there?” Indeed I was there. I don’t know why I said that.

Anxiety inducing thing two: I fear that nobody will come to my birthday celebration, and I will be left alone with a sad balloon. I have had many a nightmare about this. Admittedly, most years, I do not have a birthday celebration because of this very fact, and spend the night eating peanut butter out of the jar. But this year my boyfriend conned me into organising “drinks” which quite frankly makes me want to “die”.

I have tried to cancel aforementioned “drinks” approximately 12 times in the last two days. I am 99.2 per cent sure nobody will come, and that strange people will stare at me and my sad balloon. I am tempted to feign an opportunistic asthma attack, and cancel an hour out… and then go buy peanut butter.

Anxiety inducing thing three: The Facebook stuff. What do I… do with the Facebook wall posts? Do I like them? Do I comment a generic thank you message on every single one? Is it rude if I don’t do… anything at all? What exactly is the social protocol here? HELP. MEEEEE.

To cope with these feels, I beg the people around me to play it cool and not make a fuss.

I warned the Mamamia team that under no circumstances are they to make my birthday a “thing”. They listened. This was waiting on my desk when I got in this morning.

So THERE, world, I SAID IT. I do not like my birthday.

I very much appreciate the people who wish me a happy birthday, or who buy me presents, or even give me a hug, but... yeah... no I really just don't like it.

I'm a monster. Albeit an awkward monster, but a monster nonetheless.

But it feels oh-so-good getting this off my chest.