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#GiveAHug: Toronto boy fighting cancer is asking people to hug on March 5

Tomorrow, 8-year-old Sebastian Yanquelevech will undergo brain surgery for the second time in his life.

When he was 4, he was diagnosed with a large brain tumour. Surgery removed most of it, although he recently started suffering multiple seizures a day, making a second procedure necessary.

The North York, Ont., boy says there’s one way people can help him and his family get through this difficult time: hug.

Sebastian and his mother, Nadine Weis, are asking people to show their support by hugging their loved ones on surgery day, March 5.

“I want to tell them so they can hug each other and that will make me feel awesome,” Sebastian told CTV News.

Weis told the Toronto Star that she came up with the hug idea after her son told her, “I don’t want you to be alone while I’m in surgery.”

While she insisted that her husband and family would make sure she wasn’t alone, Sebastian wasn’t reassured — until Weis suggested recruiting the power of the hug.

“I urge everybody…on March 5…to hug the person beside you and when you hug that person, all of those beautiful endorphins and magical energy will be released into the universe and I know that they will reach my son,” Weis said in a video posted on YouTube.

Weis told CTV News that the response to #GiveAHug has been “remarkable” — she’s received hugging commitments from people in Europe, Australia and the Philippines — and Sebastian says he’s not so scared anymore.

Sebastian’s doctor, Dr. Berge Minassian, a neurologist at Toronto’s Sick Kids Hospital, is on board with the hug campaign.

“I think it’s wonderful. It’s a young child speaking from the heart,” Dr. Minassian told the Toronto Star. “He seems to kind of want to take care of his mom’s worries rather than himself.”

Spread the love online with the hashtag #GiveAHug — and hug someone for Sebastian tomorrow.