This Mom Caused A Stir After Revealing Her Daughter Won't Get Yearly Birthday Parties

A TikTok mom is going viral on TikTok for her hot take about kids’ birthday parties, in the sense that, she doesn’t want to do them at all.

“Under no circumstances will I be throwing my daughter a birthday party every single year,” Marissa Light said in a now-viral TikTok video. “Here's the deal: She is getting a first birthday party, she is getting a Sweet Sixteen and she is getting a graduation party. Other than that, she is not getting any more birthday parties."

Now, before the claws come out ready to pounce with judgment, she does have a point! When kids are super little, the parties tend to be filled with adults who probably don’t want to be there anyway. Does anyone really like anyone else’s kids?

Light, who has an 11-month-old daughter named Daisy, explained her reasoning further.

“Now, I have been to many children's birthday parties whether they were 3 ... 7 ... 12 ... and I'm sorry but as someone who did not have a kid at the time, they were not enjoyable. And I don't even think the kid noticed that I was there. I am not going to force that on my friends and family,” she explained.

She added, “Now look, if you are someone who genuinely enjoys throwing your child a birthday party, pop off, Queen. Do what you want to do. I'm not telling anyone else how to live their lives. I just personally don't find it necessary and I'm not going to be doing it.”

That being said, Light wanted to make it clear that she will still be celebrating her daughter’s special day, including plans with extended family. She’s not a monster!

"We will have dinner and cake with them every single year to celebrate my daughter's birthday," she said in the video. "And every year on her birthday, we are going to do a 'Daisy Day' or an 'All About You' day."

"When siblings come, we're going to allow her to choose whether she wants someone to watch them or whether she wants them to come and participate in whatever activity we're doing," added Light.

Light isn’t naive enough to think that Daisy might want a birthday party one day. If so, she can choose between a 'Daisy Day’ and a classic birthday party.

"And again, if you like to throw yearly parties, throw yearly parties," she said in the video. "I'm just saying as someone who has been to a lot of them and kind of felt obligated to be at them, I'm just not going to be doing it — it's a lot of stress on my part to organize and plan and put on the party and I'm not going to be doing that to my friends who don't even have children, my family who, their children will be older. I just don't want a bunch of people sitting around at my house all day."

The message was not well-received by TikTok users who called Light everything in the book, including a “terrible mom.”

However, some users saw where she was coming from, commending the mom for her against-the-grain take.

“An introverted kid will love this. Just make sure that you're celebrating that kid the way they'd like. Not the way you want to celebrate them,” one user wrote.

Another said, “I never had a birthday party and I turned out fine."

Light explained to Scary Mommy that Daisy will still get her time to shine when her birthday comes, despite being taken to task by commenters.

“My husband and I have been very open with the fact that we will be doing an ‘All About You’ day instead of yearly birthday parties with most of our families,” she says, explaining further that she didn’t mean any disrespect about saying kid’s birthday parties weren’t her favorite thing.

“I think a big misunderstanding people seem to be having is that I somehow look down upon my family and friends that have invited me to their kids birthday parties, which isn't the case at all,” she says. “Or that I implied I should have been the center of attention at other kids birthday parties which I absolutely didn't, that would be so weird to me if that's how I was treated; I probably would walk out without saying a word if anything like that happened. “

“There are other ways to make your child feel special on their birthday that don't include dragging out childless adults or overwhelming already overburdened parents that you love and care about,” she continued.

Light also touched on the fact that birthday parties have gotten a bit out of control as far as presentation goes and that the pressure to put on a large afraid oftentimes becomes the invisible labor of the default parent aka mom.

“I received a lot of comments telling me it's ‘just one day’ and let me tell you, for the mom who is planning it — no it's not,” she tells Scary Mommy.

“That comment just solidifies how much moms do each and every day that go unseen and unheard. I don't want my daughter (currently my only child) to look back and think, ‘My mom put on a lot of birthday parties for me,’” she continues. “I want her to reminisce with me about her 6th birthday when we both got princess makeovers or her 12th birthday where she finally beat her Dad in a go-kart race, or the special vacation we took for her 10th birthday.”

“It's not about not wanting to put in time or energy because I'd argue my plan is going to take just as much, if not more time and energy than a party (I mean imagine what kids can come up with for a "yes" day),” she says. “It's about wanting to bond with my babies and create extra-special birthday memories with them. I want to be present in those moments and memories that she'll have because as an adult, those are the memories I cherish the most with my own parents.”