(18M) I’ve always been shy, and as a result, touch starved. I rarely ever got hugs from people outside my family, much less girls. And don’t even mention other kinds of contact/kino, because I wasn’t even aware of that.

Recently, I’ve been making an effort to change that. I’m the one offering hugs now (although mainly to girls I’m friends with), and it makes me happy and more confident when I see that they are enjoying the hug too.

But today I finally stepped beyond just hugs. I was hanging out with a friend (18F) and there were some highlights.

  • She held out her hand to give me a coin, and while I was picking up the coin I decided to just brush my hand a little longer across her fingers and just feel the smooth skin of her fingers.

  • When we were walking out of the wrong movie theater with the movie still playing, I was on her right side. To talk to her, I wrapped my left arm around her back, holding her waist, and pulled her closer to whisper what I was saying.

  • When I dropped her off at her house, we hugged in the car and as we were letting go, I slowly brushed my left hand on the left side of her body down to her waist, while our cheeks were also touching.

I know this is very tame but my New Year’s resolution is to get better at this and do this with girls who I haven’t know for as long. I still have a long ways to go, but when I did this today it felt so natural and not planned or forced.

And on this last day of 2019, I wish you all a happy and prosperous new year and decade!