If you are invited to an adult birthday party do you expect to give a gift?

Asked by JLeslie (65421) January 14th, 2019 from iPhone

I threw a birthday party for myself and I received more gifts than I think I ever have in my life! I just didn’t expect it, and almost feel badly I didn’t explicitly tell people no gifts.

The more I thought about it, I guess I would bring a gift to a birthday party usually, but to put the party more into context for you, where I live there are potluck parties constantly. This one I hosted I called a birthday party, because it’s in January, and I brought in some extra food myself and a birthday cake and a few decorations. It didn’t really occur to me that titling it “birthday party” would trigger all of the gifts.