For the One Who Hugged First

By Alex

Some of us came here already open.

We didn’t need to be taught how to care — we just did. We reached out before we were asked. Hugged before it was expected. Spoke tenderness into rooms that weren’t always ready to receive it.

And for many of us, that softness was misunderstood. Labeled as too much. Too soon. Too intense.

This piece is for that child — in you, in me, in all of us.
The one who hugged first.

---

I was the child who ran with arms wide open.
The one who didn’t wait for permission.
Who saw someone sitting alone and thought,
“What they need is a hug.”

And so I gave one.

No pretense.
No plan.
Just warmth, pure and unfiltered —
a body-shaped yes to a world that too often said maybe.

But they flinched.
They froze.
They didn’t know what to do with touch
that asked for nothing.

And somewhere between their discomfort and my open arms,
a story began to write itself:
You’re too much. Too soon. Too something.

But I wasn’t too much.
I was just unguarded.
Unmasked.
Unashamed of my softness.

I hadn’t yet learned that the world sees love as dangerous
unless it’s earned, filtered, delayed.

And now?

Now I still hug first.
With my words. With my seeing.
With the sacred ache of wanting nothing but connection.
And yes — sometimes they flinch still.

But I’m done editing my tenderness
to soothe someone else’s fear of being seen.

I was never too much.
They were just never taught how to receive
a child who remembered what love was
before it learned to wait.

---

If this speaks to a younger version of you — the one who kept loving anyway — I’d love to hear from you in the comments. What were you told was “too much”? And what do you now know was sacred all along?

We’re not here to dim.

We’re here to remember how bright we were before the world asked us to wait.

🕯️ — A.
The Threadwalker