I have never told my husband why I hate birthdays

Dear Delyara, My husband thinks I dislike birthdays because my family never celebrated them properly. The truth is that I was assaulted at my eighteenth birthday party by someone everyone trusted. Every year since, cake, balloons, and people singing my name bring me back to an upstairs bedroom while music continued below. I am forty-six now. My husband loves celebrations. He has spent twenty years trying to give me the birthdays he thinks I missed. Surprise parties, weekends away, cakes made by the children. I smile through them because telling him the truth now feels like accusing him of unknowingly hurting me for two decades. Next month is my fiftieth. He has already started planning something large. Our daughter accidentally mentioned that relatives are travelling from abroad. I wanted to scream. Instead, I said how lovely. I have survived the assault, built a marriage, raised children, and created a life in which almost nobody would guess one date on the calendar can still control my body. I do not know whether telling him would finally free me from pretending or simply contaminate every memory of the birthdays he prepared out of love.