When I came to college I was vehemently opposed to hugs, and pretty much any other form of physical touch. I thought it was uncomfortable and awkward. One of my friends even said once that I would visibly cringe whenever she would hug me if that tells you how much I wasn't in favor of such a small act of love and kindness. My disinterest in physical contact had nothing to do with not liking people or not wanting to be around people. If I'm quite honest my top love language back then, and still to this day, is quality time. It was just that I wasn't a huge fan of hugs.

It was my sophomore year when I truly began to see a change in how I viewed hugging. It was a slow transition, and by that, I mean the slug in "Monsters University" slow. If I had to create a timeline for this transition I think one of the first minor turning points would have to be during the first semester of sophomore year.

The story I'm about to tell is quite awkward and makes me look like a complete dweeb, but it perfectly epitomizes my perceptions of physical contact back then. I was in the gym stretching before I began my workout when I hear my name getting called across the gym. I never really saw people I knew at the gym so it was a little shocking for me to begin with. Low and behold, it was a guy I was in a group with for one of my classes. As he approached me I noticed he had his arm extended out towards me.

This is where things got a little weird, well at least for me. His arm was situated in such a way that I couldn't tell if he was going for a hug, handshake, or one of those weird "bro hug" type of things. It ended up we went for the side hug, and let me tell you he might not have felt awkward but I certainly did. I barely knew this guy and here we were in the gym hugging each other. Now don't take this story as I am now completely comfortable with hugging all strangers, that's still an odd concept to me, but I will hug friends and loved ones.

But enough about my awkward, dweeb moments. Let's fast forward to the end of sophomore year. Precisely two weeks before I went home for the summer. Sat around a picnic table I formed a connection with a group of four other people that drastically altered my mindset on hugging.

I'm the type of person that I connect with people fairly quickly. It's probably the extrovert in me, but who knows for sure. Either way, every time I saw one of these people they made it a point to give me a hug. At first, I still cringed every time it happened, but in two weeks I spent nearly every day with these people and they changed me.

They changed me because they forced me to be vulnerable. They challenged me to open up about myself in a way that no one else had ever done before. I was raw with these people, I was fully myself without any hesitations or reservations. The same type of thing happened at the end of this past summer when I went on a trip to Montana with 15 others for two weeks. On that trip, I was tested and had to rely on those around me to get me through extensive hikes or moments of weakness.

So maybe it wasn't necessarily that I just one day woke up and decided that I liked hugs now, but it took people getting me to open up and be vulnerable around them to the point where I became comfortable enough to embrace the idea of physical touch.

Now, physical touch has gone from being at the bottom of my list of ways I feel love to being one of my top ways of experiencing it. Looking back I don't know why it took me so long to reach this point, but I am not upset it happened. I'm thankful for the people in my life that dug deeper and loved me well whether that was through getting to know me and spending time with me or giving me hugs or holding my hand in times of need.

If you've never taken the love languages test or don't have any idea what I'm talking about in relation to that here's the link to the site so you can find out the breakdown of how you best experience love.