Birthdays can be a great time to celebrate another year of life. The once-a-year event is a momentous occasion to be thankful for being alive, to reflect on the past, and to make plans. It is just reasonable to commemorate your birthday with parties, gifts, and food with the significant people in your life.

What if you find yourself feeling low knowing your birthday is approaching? Does the prospect of having another birthday diminish your energy and spirit that you stay away from anything that reminds you of it? Do you feel sad and disappointed, so you choose not to celebrate your birthday at all? Are you just feeling unusually unhappy, or are you feeling genuinely depressed on your birthday?

A Phenomenon Called Birthday Depression

If these are exactly what you feel when your birthday comes around, you likely have the “birthday blues.” Birthday blues, or birthday depression or sadness, is a biological and emotional health issue caused by the heightened consciousness that you are aging. With such a softer term as birthday blues given to the real thing, birthday depression is undermined and brushed off as a transient feeling that does not receive the attention it needs.

Like other meaningful celebrations, such as Christmas and New Year, birthdays are a difficult reality many people may try to spend being alone, or with selected people only, or avoid to any extent. Whether the general low mood arises specifically because of the event or a symptom of chronic depression, it can invite other negative feelings, such as sadness, hopelessness, guilt, despair, and more to the birthday party.

Studies show that birthday blues increase the risk of self-harm in the general population as well as in patients diagnosed and being treated for behavioral and emotional health issues. The results suggest that, although birthdays are supposed to be a good and happy occasion, they are periods of higher risk for self-harming. This is particularly true for the male population, regardless of whether they are receiving treatment and care for their behavioral and emotional health condition or not. This highlights the importance of taking birthday depression seriously and addressing the condition with kindness and understanding.

Potential Reasons Behind Birthday Depression

It can be perplexing why you might feel low on your birthday. Birthdays are often celebrated and shared with family and friends. You get special treatment, promos and complimentary treats from your favorite restaurant, coffee shop, and salon. These perks and goodies are, however, overshadowed by the gloom hanging over your special day.

Behind the introverted behavior could be depression. The following are reasons that contribute to a birthday being so emotionally difficult to confront:

• Age – The numbers adding to your age can be scary because they come with physical changes that accompany aging. The fear of mortality, knowing there is less time left to accomplish your goals can be more felt. As you turn a certain age, it cannot be helped to feel nostalgic about your childhood and past birthdays, when you were younger, happier and more carefree.
• Achievements – While birthdays are a joyful time to reminisce and monitor your progress, they can also be a disappointing occasion to track down your failures and inadequacies, leaving you with a feeling of general disappointment in yourself.
• Expectations and Pressures – Society has put a fair amount of pressure to accomplish your goals and expectations of reaching certain milestones on a specific timetable. Birthdays can bring this into sharp focus, causing you to feel incompetent, especially if you compare yourself to more successful peers in your age group. Your birthday can heighten the feeling of hopelessness or despondency if you have not hit certain expectations or you’re still struggling to find life’s purpose or meaning.
• Dysfunctional Family Dynamics – The family is said to be the surest source of happiness, but it can also be a spring of tension, stress, and sadness for you. Even if you wish for an epic, happy birthday, your family are the very people who trigger negative emotions on a day like your birthday.
• Few Friends – It is difficult to find real friends, and the few ones you keep have either moved on or passed away. Without the presence of close friends to cheer you up, your birthday can be a sad occasion to miss them and feel lonely.
• Absence of a Significant Someone – Without a meaningful relationship and someone to shower you with love and affection, birthdays can magnify your feelings of being unloved and unimportant.

Depression and Shame: The Uninvited Guests

Many complex factors can scramble into the party, bringing with them depression to spoil your day. While it is not forbidden or wrong to be unhappy on your big day, it is another thing to be sad and be ashamed about your emotional struggle. It is, therefore, of importance to understand why the feeling of shame lingers around a serious issue, such as birthday depression:

• Societal expectations – People celebrating their birthday are expected to be happy. Being alive is something to be grateful about, whether life is good or bad. If you are not happy on your birthday, society thinks something may be wrong with you. Having birthday depression does not mean you are ungrateful or a social outcast.
• Guilt for feeling bad – Like most people, you are probably pressured to feel a certain way and you push yourself to be. When you feel unhappy, you feel bad. Emotions are not experienced at random, nor are they mere outward manifestations. You need to accept and respect your own emotions and moods triggered by specific factors, whether it is your birthday or not.
• Lack of knowledge about birthday depression – The fact that birthday depression is misunderstood, and little is known about it, people may not figure out and relate to your feelings. In order to avoid rejection and judgment, you submit to the custom, pretend you are okay, and deny your depressed feeling.

Counseling: A Special Gift for Your Birthday

Birthdays are a great time to celebrate your existence today and pay homage to the past years. Everyone deserves to be happy and have a blast on their birthdays because to reach another year is a milestone that is worth celebrating. Birthdays are an occasion to look forward to and not to shudder away from.

If you are feeling low, experiencing negative feelings, or struggling with your mood every time your birthday comes around, these feelings can bring you down on the actual day. Birthday depression is common and there is nothing to be ashamed about. The good news is that it can be easily treated if you seek professional help as soon as possible. You can seek immediate relief by receiving counseling, especially if you have a high risk for self-harm.

Are you looking for a way to treat yourself on your birthday? Then look after your emotional wellness. Gift yourself with counseling to unwrap the root cause and blow out the candles of your birthday depression. That is what the right fit therapist independently contracted with Carolina Counseling Services – Pinehurst, NC will do to help you. Escaping depression with counseling can be the only way to truly feel how it is to be wished a happy birthday.  Call now to schedule an appointment before your special day.

Related Articles:

• Beyond Gloom: Getting Out of Depression
• Recognizing the Signs of Geriatric Depression