Not too long ago, I stumbled upon a TikTok video. It featured a dude ripping people who wish their spouses “happy birthday” on social media (watch it here). His demeanor was very smug as he argued there is no need to wish your wife/husband a “happy birthday” online when they are probably sitting right next to you as the post is drafted. Callng people who do this “insecure,” his overarching point was DON’T POST ON SOCIAL, JUST TELL THEM FACE-TO-FACE.
This TikToker would hate me. I wish Sidney a happy birthday every year on social media and I just don’t do it on Facebook either; I publish a birthday post on all my social platforms. Furthermore, I even dedicate an entire blog post to my wife on her special day.
I always wish my wife a “happy birthday” on all my social platforms.
Do I publish these posts because I am insecure? Well, I guess that might be a possibility, but it would be subconsciously. Believe it or not, I do have stronger, overt reasons for publishing happy birthday posts for Sidney. If you allow me, let me just point out three brief ones…
Wishing my wife a happy birthday notifies a lot of other people that it is her birthday. Of course not everyone is going to care but some definitely will—and that will allow them to reach out when otherwise they never would have because they never would have known. Sure, Facebook does have a feature that lists the birthdays of friends but many people never look at it. These days on social media, I find out about birthdays of friends because others issue them a birthday greeting and the algorithm decides to put it in my feed.
Extending a birthday wish to my wife on social media also allows me to be more creative. If I only wished her happy birthday face-to-face, I wouldn’t be able to use photos/video like social media permits me to. That means I couldn’t post a collage of photos from the past year or include the glamour shot I specifically asked the photographer to take during our family portraits in the fall. Wishing Sidney a happy birthday face-to-face is cool but I also enjoy a full multimedia experience as well.
Finally, I appreciate the memories that are documented via social media birthday wishes. Say what you will about someone’s digital footprint, but I actually do value the staying power of social media birthday posts. I use an app called Timehop that enables me each January 28 to rewind and view each birthday post I published for Sidney from the past 10+ years. I like taking that trip down memory lane and I think my kids will also find it kind of cool one of these days, too. There is just something neat about watching our ages and appearances change throughout the years.
So yes, I am not embarrassed to admit that I do publish social media birthday posts for my wife. And you know what? I don’t even think I am that insecure ever. Now believe it or not, this TikToker even added in his video that wishing your children a happy birthday on social media is even more asinine than your spouse, but that is a rebuttal for another day…stay tuned. Don’t Blink.
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Brent, my wife and I have had this discussion a lot and it was fun to read your post together. She brought up a good point that maybe the tiktoker (not that I watched his video) or people like him are trying to point out the people who post about their spouse all the time, “frequently and fervently” as my wife said. Or whoever they are dating. Anyways, the posting about your kids thing is a whole other topic. But we have totally seen the insecure relationships that try to use social media to cover up a lack of actually telling your significant other those things.. anyways, just a fun convo for us tonight. Thanks for the topic for us to chat about. Maybe I’ll post our convo on my YouTube channel 🙂
Honored that you and your dear wife read my post and that it sparked discussion. You do bring up some valid points. Thanks for reading and please tell Jor—-oops, you are anonymous, sorry . Hope to see you soon!