We know you get tired of the depressing, we suck, someone called us the n-word, can’t find a man, need to lose weight, racial discrimination news just like we do, which is why we want to try to give you at least one reason to smile each week. With the world beating up on us every chance it gets, there ought to be one place you can go to to find something to make you feel good about you and your fellow sistahs and that’s why we’re bringing you the good (black girl) news. No bashing, no advice, no side-eyeing, no shade, just a random feel good fact to let you know just how incredible you are—and something we hope you’ll pass on to the other fab ladies in you’re life so they know they’re the business too. Deal?

Here’s the good news this week: We’re living longer!

Let every other study tell it, black people have one foot in the grave and the other in the hospital between the diseases we’re affected with and random acts of violence, but we’re actually living longer now and starting to close the gap on life expectancy. In a new study comparing life expectancy between the five-year period from 2003 to 2008, black men’s age expectancy increased from 68.8 to 70.08 years and black women had nearly a 2-year increase as well, going from a life expectancy of  75.7 years to 77.5.

“For the most part, blacks are making small but important gains in terms of life expectancy,” said Sam Harper of McGill University in Montreal, Quebec, who is the lead author of the new report, published as a research letter in the Journal of the American Medical Association. “The gap at the present time is as low as it’s ever been since we’ve been measuring life expectancy.”

And if we keep focusing on our personal health and encouraging our families to do the same, these numbers will only increase!