This has been a crazy year for me, and I simply feel like I need to be thankful for all the wonderful humans in my life. So I’m going to write some blogs about people who I am thankful for who mean a lot to me. These people have helped shape who I am, and for that I am grateful. Since I am not going to be seeing a lot of these people over Thanksgiving, I wanted to do something else. And I chose to make this as a blog so all these people’s future employers can read about how amazing these people are. SEO people. (But seriously if you’re considering hiring them, they’re amazing.)

First on the list is Anne Dupuis, my mom’s cousin’s daughter. So a cousin. Or something.

For a while this woman was just someone who had this really awesome wedding when I was younger. Like really, really cool where I got to dress up in costumes and tell some ghost stories and lock my older brother and cousin in a creepy basement. Yes, we got into some trouble for this, but still.. pretty awesome.

This year though, I got the opportunity to go to Los Angeles for a conference for Fangirl, and Anne so graciously let me and my coworker Sean stay with her on her couches. While I was there, Anne gave me some really great advice about personal work and how important it is to really understand your own struggles in order to be able to deal with them.

This month, I am grateful for strong independent woman who never shrink themselves for people who refuse to grow. Anne is one such woman who inspires me daily to recognize that most of the time, the way people treat me is just a reflection of their relationship with themself and not a reflection of my worth as a person. If someone treats you like shit, it’s probably because they treat themselves like shit and need to do some personal work to figure that out.

“No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.”

—Eleanor Roosevelt

Anne taught me about self reflection and recognizing, accepting and working on my own demons and for that I am forever grateful.

She also let me borrow her flip flops to shower in when I had athlete’s foot, which is pretty dang nice, too.

Thank you Anne.