The Conversation with Jill Smokler I’m Grateful We RecordedI’m sending something different this week.
My friend Jill Smokler, founder of Scary Mommy—the blog that inspired SO many others—died on June 22, 2026. Around what would have been her 49th birthday, I’m sharing a bonus episode of Dear Nina: Conversations About Friendship that means a lot to me: a replay of the conversation Jill asked me to record with her in the summer of 2024, soon after she was diagnosed with glioblastoma, an aggressive form of brain cancer. If you loved Jill, I hope hearing her voice in this episode is a comfort. If you didn’t know her, I hope the episode gives you a glimpse of why countless longtime followers, fans, and friends felt so connected to her candor and warmth. Jill was a certain kind of famous—not movie-star famous, but very known in a way that mattered. Her work and her support of so many writers and readers helped women feel less alone, starting with Scary Mommy. She continued in that supportive role after she sold Scary Mommy and publicly figured out her next move, which included her podcast and online magazine, She’s Got Issues. The magazine version allowed her to experiment with her love for graphic design again, and I loved talking to her about her vision for that project. I knew Jill first from Washington University in St. Louis, where we met as freshmen, but our friendship and professional relationship grew much more as adults. (We talked about why that is in other episodes, linked further down.) We collaborated in important ways in our work over the years, and I credit Jill with helping me understand what writing on the internet could be.
Jill was proud of this conversation we had two years ago. You will hear her humor, her honesty, and her way of making room for the awful and the absurd at the same time. In the episode, Jill spoke frankly about her diagnosis and what it felt like to receive an outpouring of love from people who knew her in every era of her life: childhood, college, parenting, work, and of course from her MASSIVE online community. We discussed what friendship looks like in a crisis: what helped, what didn’t, and what she wished people understood. Jill was especially clear about the value of brief, consistent check-ins with no expectation of a reply and the relief of meals and food delivery gift cards. Jill also reflected on her children and what she wants them to understand about friendship, her best friend, the friendships she built over a lifetime, and the future she felt robbed of getting to enjoy. Those few lines at the end of the episode are heartbreaking. But this episode is not “just” heartbreaking. It’s also funny, blunt, generous, and “very Jill.” Thank you for listening, and for helping me honor my friend. I know she meant a lot to many of you, too. Find the episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or anywhere you listen to podcasts.
Links mentioned in the episode:
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