Happy New Year all!

Every time the holidays come to pass, I realize just how piss-poor of a job I did reaching out to friends/family to wish them well. To be honest, I’ve never had a big family and therefore am not really used to “big” holiday celebrations. My partner and I have moved out-of-state, my parents are deceased, I’m an only child, and we’re DINK so it’s usually just the two of us for the major holidays. We have two dogs so we like to stay home and keep things lowkey.

The problem is that we’re so lowkey that I often forget that I’m supposed to reach out to others with well wishes and gifts. Today, I broke down because I didn’t even think to send Christmas gifts for two of my closest friends’ kids.

I do this with birthdays as well. It’s not that I can’t remember birth dates… I know my friends and family members birthdays by heart. But unless there’s a celebration that I’m invited to, I’ll completely forget to call or at least text on the day of. I’m also not on any social media except Reddit so I don’t get reminders about it. Setting reminders in my phone calendar has thus-far been inefficient as they blend in with other notifications and get lost in the mix. Usually I’ll realize a few days to weeks after the day has come and gone and then spiral into shame and embarrassment over being a bad friend.

I don’t mind if people don’t reach out to me on my birthday or holidays but it feels like if I don’t do it for others then I’ll slowly fade out of others’ lives or be viewed as a bad friend. Even though I don’t have a big family, I do have quite a few friends to keep up with and I feel overwhelmed. Is there a way to improve this? Are there apps that can help?