I have talked a lot on my blog about my Aunt Shell and her battle with cancer.  Even though I am very proud of my Aunt Shell, this blog post is not about her.  This blog is about my other aunt.  To all of her friends she is known as Honey-bug; to her nieces and nephews (one of them being me) she is known as Auntie, and to the younger generation of nieces and nephews she’s known as Auntie Bug. My aunt is one of the most creative and smart people I have ever known.  Being an artsy person she would always buy us kids coloring books and cool nicknacks when we were little, that we all thought were awesome.  As we grew older she would teach us that Superman was the best superhero and Jerry Seinfeld was the funniest comedian.  She read so many books that her house and desk at work started to look like a library; at least until she got a Kindle.  There was only one thing about my aunt that I never thought was cool…. she smoked.

Every year she would ask all of her nieces and nephews what we wanted for Christmas and every year at least one of us would ask her to stop smoking.  These requests always went unfulfilled, and with us being kids, we were always still happy with our cool new coloring book or toy.  However, my dad came home from work a few weeks ago and told me that Auntie was going to quit smoking.  I was so happy that I wanted to call her right away and tell her how proud I was of her.  I told her of my joy and pride in her for making this tough but necessary life decision.  Her response almost brought me to tears when she said she made this decision because she saw how hard I was working to get myself stronger in my videos on Instagram and Facebook and was inspired to make a change in her life too.  Many people have been telling me that my videos are inspiring but I didn’t know I had the power to change the habits of a 40+ year smoker.  I love my aunt and am incredibly proud of her!!  I hope she will inspire you too.