How do you celebrate your birthday? Big bash, night on the town, intimate soiree – or grit your teeth and wait for it to be over?

• It can depend on a range of things – personality, age, past experiences – and we all have a different idea of the perfect birthday.
• We recently surveyed our readers, just for fun, and found that while the majority liked to mark the occasion with some celebration – just 11.2 per cent preferred to let the day pass unmentioned – the kinds of celebrations are split right down the middle.
• For 44.6 per cent of our readers, low-key celebrations are the way to go, while 44.1 per cent say the bigger, the better.
• In some ways, this is not surprising – we all know some party animals, some who prefer a quiet gathering or even simply a night out with a partner to mark an event.
• But the great thing here is that most of us do still see our birthdays as something to celebrate
• Perhaps it is the one day of the year we relinquish control and allow ourselves to be the ones who are looked after and spoiled; perhaps it is simply another excuse for a party; or maybe we use birthdays as the chance to catch up with a circle of friends who don’t get to catch up as much as they used to.
• With family’s birthdays, friend’s birthdays, births, holidays, engagements, weddings, anniversaries and so much more to fill up the monthly calendars, the humble birthday can sometimes be overshadowed. However, it is an important day, for the simple reason it is the chance to celebrate that we are here, and we are fabulous!
• The 11.2 per cent of respondents who took our survey and stated they preferred to let the day slide past without marking it are missing out.
• Maybe these people dread getting another year older, or shy away from anything which gains them attention, but birthdays are the one day where it is all about you.
• If you are a low-key person, maybe it’s just a chance to ditch the chores and go for a long walk on the beach, have a facial or get your nails done; to zone out and read a book from front to back, uninterrupted; or to grab a friend and a bottle of wine.
• If not, a party can not only be fantastic for you, others will enjoy the chance to catch up, mingle and celebrate with you.
• However you do it, remember that birthdays are important – celebrate them!