You're given a small farm away from civilization, but are supported by a team of vets and doctors. You're only job is to make sure the child is happy and raised well.
I'm struggling to tell whether I'm thinking / feeling a sensible way, so I'm going to try to break this down and separate out the facts from what's going on in my head as much as possible.
Factual: It is my birthday this week. The usual thing with my family is for our parents to arrange a meal out together, usually getting in touch with the one having the birthday a week or so beforehand to figure out when and where to go. That has not happened, and it's now getting to the point where I'm wondering if they've forgotten about me. Even if they get in touch tomorrow to try to plan something, it's going to feel rather last minute and half-baked.
Obvious question 1: I'm an adult, why do I care about my birthday? Because, as I believe is the case for a lot of us, especially those who are single, I generally feel overlooked, taken for granted, and that nobody cares about me. Everything is on my shoulders, I'm the one who has to make the effort to deal with everything from day-to-day stuff to trying to organise things to get me out the house and stop myself falling into a rut. This is the one day a year when I feel that I can hope for someone else to make even a small amount of effort for me. If I can't even have that, I feel it shows that no-one, not even my closest blood relatives, cares about me.
Obvious question(s) 2: Do I genuinely believe my own parents would forget my birthday? Have they ever done anything like this before? They've never done anything like this before, I would say they've generally been pretty good parents, and good at treating me and my siblings pretty evenly. I want to say that I don't believe they'd forget my birthday, but that's not the way the evidence is currently pointing. A sibling is going through some major stuff at the moment (positive, but major), and I do wonder if that's occupying their attention, leading to me being overlooked (just to cover things, I know this timing is not malicious, it's just how events have worked out). Of course, if that is the case, there's two problems: They're showing they have a favourite child and it's not me, and that I matter so little to them that they haven't even thought to get in touch with me to explain things.
Obvious question 3: Why don't I reach out to them instead of waiting for them to contact me? Well, to copy and paste from above: "I generally feel overlooked, taken for granted, and that nobody cares about me. This is the one day a year when I feel that I can hope for someone else to make even a small amount of effort for me." If I have to take the initiative to ask them to act as if they care, it rather proves that they don't.
Obvious question 4: Hang on, if I'm an adult, doesn't that mean my parents are old? Maybe they're just not up to organising things. Nope, they are in their 70's, but still pretty healthy and in possession of their faculties. I saw them last month when they came back from a week-long trip to the coast they'd organised. They were talking about ideas for another trip later in the year. They've fully capable of planning things.
Other information: OK, this is going to be a bit of a vent/dumping section. Not only am I sensitive about my birthday because of wanting to feel that someone cares about me, I've also got some history with being let down by those I thought cared about me. Before I turned 30, I had a group that I thought were my friends. We'd see each other regularly, and I genuinely thought we were people that could rely on each other. I helped them out with things, some minor, some very significant, because that's what friends do and I was able to. When I turned 29, I messaged them in the week beforehand, asking to meet up for drinks to celebrate. None of them could make it, but maybe that was on me. I hadn't given them a lot of notice. Lesson learned. So next year, turning 30, a big one, I made sure to contact them about a month in advance, planning drinks at the nearest weekend to celebrate. Not only did none of them want to make the effort to show up, half of them didn't even bother to respond. Another lesson learned, but this one is that they weren't my friends, they were happy to use me when it was convenient for them, but when it came for time for them to put in even a tiny bit of effort for me, they showed they didn't give a shit. I cut every single one of them out of my life. It was very lonely, but I'd rather face the harsh, honest truth of being alone than to lie to myself.
I think I've rambled long enough, and hopefully been somewhat coherent. Time to hand over to the hive mind of Reddit. Am I being crazy? Do you have any advice? This is really affecting my mental state; I should be looking forward to my birthday with some amount of pleasant anticipation, but instead I'm worried I'll be having to, at minimum, have the difficult job of telling my family that they've really hurt me. I don't want to cut contact with them, but equally, I don't know if I want to be in touch if they demonstrate they don't care about me. I'm not sure what it would take for me to forgive them, and I worry a blow of this size could trigger a mental health crisis for me.
Edit for additional question: Do you think I'm doing the right thing by waiting? On the one hand, I'm not trying to avoid being vulnerable: I'm extending trust to those who have always been trustworthy before and believing in them. On the other, it could be seen as a dick move, hitting them with a test they didn't know about. I am honestly so wrapped up in this that I don't have the perspective to see the answer.