When, and how you celebrate your birthday can be a deeply personal decision.

Some people are party animals, and want to be surrounded by their friends and loved ones for a big night.

Others prefer a quieter, more intimate affair – while some people don’t want to celebrate at all.

All of these choices are okay, the important thing is that the person is celebrating (or not) in the way in which they feel happiest and most comfortable.

So when the woman in this story was offered a special birthday treat by her parents, she jumped at the opportunity – even though it meant excluding a few of her wider circle of friends.

But she never anticipated the drama it would cause between her and her friend with a neighboring birthday.

Read on to find out what happened between the pair.

AITA for not wanting to share my birthday?

I am a 20-year-old woman, and my birthday is coming up soon.

Because I’ll be turning 21, my parents want to do something special.

They’ve hired a party bus for me and my friends for the night so we can drink, hang out and do karaoke before properly going out to celebrate that night.

But this didn’t come without its challenges.

I’m very excited and have invited my group of friends.

However, because its a party bus, there is a limit of how many people I can invite (fifteen max, me included).

So I invited my closest fifteen friends in the group (there’s about 20-25 of us altogether).

It sucked not being able to invite the whole group, but I’m able to have everyone I’d want to be there, so its not a huge issue.

Let’s see how her choices went down with the group as a whole.

However, one of the girls in the group, (Emily, also 20) was born the day after me.

She and I are not very close and typically only see each other in large group hang outs, never one-on-one.

She was not invited as part of the fifteen friends as we are not that close, however she (and the rest of the group) is invited to join us on the night out.

Nobody else in the group has had an issue with this arrangement – they have been understanding that there’s a limit on how many people can come, and they all seem to be aware that it isn’t something I have against them.

But for one person, the lack of party bus invite was a problem.

Emily however has apparently had an issue with not being invited. I have texted her multiple times now to check in and ask if we’re okay, to which she has told me she’s fine and its a non-issue.

But a couple of my friends have told me she’s been ranting and complaining about not being invited.

She sent me a text a couple days ago saying some people might not be able to join me to celebrate because she wants to celebrate her birthday a day early (so on my birthday).

I have checked with the group, and everyone I invited has confirmed they will be spending my birthday with me.

Uh-oh. Read on to find out how this birthday conflict continued to escalate.

This has upset her even more, as now she’s been complaining that nobody will be celebrating with her (even though we have all agreed to join her, and everyone will after the party bus).

She has said she wants to book a private room at 10pm which we all have to be there for or we can’t join her.

The party bus doesn’t end until 11pm.

Now she has began asking if we can’t just ‘share’ my birthday?

Yikes! Let’s see how this suggestion went down with the birthday girl.

She called me today asking if she can join us on the bus, so we can do a ‘shared birthday party’.

I told her no, as that would involve uninviting one of my friends who I want to be there.

Also my parents have paid for this bus while she hasn’t contributed anything.

After the call I had a couple messages from other friends who weren’t invited, saying if we shared my birthday it would save drama.

She was quite clear about how she felt about the proposition.

But its my birthday? I don’t understand why she has to celebrate on my birthday.

Mine is on a Friday, her’s is a Saturday, so both nights will be good to celebrate, and we will be with her at midnight to congratulate her turning 21 too.

Should I have just said yes and saved any drama? I don’t want this to ruin our birthdays.

AITA?

It must be really tough sharing this big group of friends, when your birthdays are on consecutive days and you both have different ideas for how to celebrate.

It seems like Emily might feel threatened, with this woman having her birthday party first, and being excluded from the party bus.

And that’s fair, but her reasons for not wanting to celebrate on her own birthday are unclear – it’s no surprise that this woman is feeling confused, and like her birthday is being trampled all over.

Let’s see what folks on Reddit had to say about this.

This person thought that Emily was simply jealous of the party bus.

While others urged her not to concede merely to keep others happy.

Meanwhile, this Redditor pointed out that you only turn 21 once, and it’s her day to share with whomever she wants.

This doesn’t need to be a competition.

If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about a daughter who invited herself to her parents’ 40th anniversary vacation for all the wrong reasons.