New York Times best-selling author, blogger, and domestic satirist Jill Smokler died on June 22 after a two-year battle with brain cancer. She was 48. Her brother, Matt Epstein, announced the news via TODAY.com:“Jill spent her life telling the truth about motherhood — that it could be wonderful and impossible in the very same breath — and in doing so, she gave millions of women permission to stop pretending and feel a little less alone. She was funny, fearless, generous, and entirely herself. More than anything she built, Jill was proudest of her three children, Lily, Ben, and Evan. We are heartbroken to lose her, and endlessly proud of the mark she left on the world.”Jill Smokler, best known as the founder of the parenting brand and website Scary Mommy, was married to Jeff Smokler for 17 years before calling it quits in March 2017, after he publicly came out as gay.Today, Jeff is a partner and Public Affairs Lead at Avoq. He joined the Washington, D.C.-based firm in December 2025 and specializes in “issue advocacy, strategic communications and stakeholder engagement across industries, with particular expertise in healthcare.” His clientele spans across the corporate, government and nonprofit sectors.He reposted the link to his ex-wife’s death bulletin from the Scary Mommy website on his LinkedIn and wrote, “Sharing sad news.” An obituary was also posted on Jill Smokler’s official Instagram. It read:“It's with broken hearts that we share that Jill Smokler passed away this morning, after a more than two-year fight with glioblastoma. She faced it the way she faced everything — funny, fierce, and completely herself. She was so many things: a New York Times bestselling author, a founder, a truth-teller. But the thing she was proudest of, always, was being a mother to Lily, Ben, and Evan.” View this post on Instagram Instagram PostAll you need to know about Jill Smokler’s ex-husbandAccording to Teamavoq.com, Jeff Smokler was born and raised in the Boston suburbs in Massachusetts. He tied the knot with Jill Smoker in 2000 and went on to have three children, daughter Lily and sons Ben and Evan. Today, they are in their early 20s or teenagers and attend college. He is also a dad to two big dogs.After announcing their mutual decision to divorce in 2017, Jeff Smokler wrote on the Scary Mommy site:“It’s been four or five years since I knew I was gay. Of course, I always knew I was different, but when you meet your soulmate when you’re 18 years old — only five years older than my own daughter is now — and that person is a woman, you simply think ‘Thank God, then, I can’t be gay.’”The father of three continued:“It wasn’t until after Jill Smokler and I were married that I started to understand my (what I perceived at the time to be) bisexuality. Once I knew, the first and only person I told was my wife. And so began a long, unexpected journey that Jill and I decided we would take together.”He explained that Jill Smokler was not just his wife/ lover but also his friend and co-parent, which is why ending their marriage was the “hardest decision” they ever made. However, without it, he was neglecting his well-being, slipping into unhealthy habits and depression, and nearly leaving his children fatherless.Luckily, he chose to come out as gay to his friends, family, Jill Smokler and their children, and life had been better ever since.“I don’t want to give the impression that this is easy, or that we have it all figured out. We both have deeply rooted, complex feelings and emotions born from a marriage largely defined by a shared secret. But whereas love simply wasn’t enough to keep us together, it turns out it comes in real handy in times of strife,” Jeff noted.Currently, Jill Smokler’s ex-husband divides his time between Baltimore and Washington, D.C. His LinkedIn bio reads:“I’m a public and corporate affairs leader working with Fortune 500, non-profit, and government clients. I’ve spent more than 25 years creating successful communications campaigns, with a focus on healthcare.”It continues:“In addition to my experience working in advocacy and strategic communications in Washington, I’m a former leader of a top life sciences digital and creative marketing agency, and a brand-builder and champion at disruptor health start-ups. MM&M Pinnacle Award 2022, PR Week Health Influencer 30, 2021, 2022.”Before joining Avoq seven months ago, Jeff Smokler served as the Chief Brand Officer at Gravie, a General Atlantic-owned health tech startup in Minneapolis, Minnesota, for 3.5 years. He attended Washington University in St. Louis and earned a bachelor’s degree in English Literature and Creative Writing in 1999.At Imre Health, Jill Smokler’s ex-husband worked as a Business Unit Leader for the first three years before becoming a Partner and President for seven years. Imre is a life sciences marketing and advertising agency.The other companies Jeff worked for in the early stages of his career include Weber Shandwick/ Powell Tate (as VP/ Senior VP), BlueCross BlueShield Association (as Executive Director of Strategic Communications/ Director of Corporate and Public Affairs/ Speechwriter to the CEO), and Health News Daily (as a reporter). He was involved with Tennessee’s Affordable Care Act.Mr Smokler also worked for the U.S. government, first as Public Affairs Coordinator at the Administrative Office of the United States Courts and later as Director of Communications at the American Health Care Association.Jeff uses the pronouns he/him and is an LGBTQ+ sponsor/ advocate. He also serves in an advisory role at MedFluencers and is a Board Member at The Compassion Museum.For consecutive years, 2021 and 2022, Jeff Smokler won the PR Week Health Influencer 30 Award. He was also the recipient of MM&M’s 2022 Pinnacle Award. View this post on Instagram Instagram PostAt the time of their divorce announcement, Jill Smokler told PEOPLE:“I signed on for this. I could have opted out, but I couldn’t wrap my head around the feeling that Jeff was my person and now I have to walk away? It’s not a secret that he kept from me. It was our secret, and we were in it together. I didn’t want to walk away.”About the mutual decision to separate, Jeff Smokler noted:“Jill and I viewed it as a piece of me that we had to deal with, but we both knew over time that it was becoming a bigger piece of me. It has not been an easy road. Jill and I had painful, deep conversations about this. It was not something we swept under the rug.”He also revealed apologizing to Jill Smokler, not for being gay or marrying or duping her, but for taking away her “moments of happiness” intentionally or not.“My sexuality and Jill’s willingness to stick it out with me definitely changed who she is, and many times, not for the better. So, I am very deeply sorry for that… The only good thing about going through any pain is that you learn about yourself and you may be able to help other people. We want to show folks that you can do divorce in a way that not just puts your children first, but can come from a place of love. And in our case, there has never been a shortage of love,” Smokler added.Jill Smokler revealed keeping her husband’s gay side a secret for 15 years and how it was affecting her mental and physical health, her relationships with friends and family, and her feeling isolated.“I could only be so open and so invested in relationships. When you’re talking to your girlfriends about details of your marriage, there was so much that I couldn’t and didn’t talk about. So, I’m looking forward to deepening and strengthening relationships of my own,” Jill noted at the time.Today, Jill Smokler's loved ones are mourning her untimely passing. They wrote on her Instagram:“If Scary Mommy gave you permission to laugh, to admit it was hard, or to feel a little less alone — that was Jill. That was always Jill. If she meant something to you, we'd love to hear it.In lieu of flowers, donations in her memory can be made to The Brain Tumor Network. Thank you for loving her, and for being part of the community she built.”The Scary Mommy website and social media pages are also full of tributes for their late founder.