Heather B. Armstrong, ‘queen of the mommy bloggers,’ dead at 47

SALT LAKE CITY — Heather Brooke Armstrong, a pioneering blogger who chronicled her struggles with motherhood, depression and alcoholism and was known as “Dooce,” died Tuesday. She was 47.

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Armstrong was known as the “queen of the mommy bloggers,” Variety reported. Her family announced her death in an Instagram post on Wednesday.

“It takes an ocean not to break,” the post read. “Hold your loved ones close and love everyone else.”

Armstrong, who recently went by her maiden name of Heather Hamilton, died by suicide, her boyfriend, Pete Ashdown, told The Associated Press. Ashdown said he found her Tuesday night at their Salt Lake City home.

Ashdown said that Armstrong had recently relapsed into alcoholism after remaining sober for more than 18 months, according to The Washington Post.

Armstrong, who was born in Memphis, Tennessee, on July 19, 1975, majored in English at Brigham Young University, the newspaper reported.

After graduating in 1997, she moved to Los Angeles before marrying Jon Armstrong, a web designer, according to the Post.

A candid writer, Armstrong founded dooce.com in 2001, People reported.

The blog spawned a dedicated following of young mothers trying to cope with the realities of raising children, the magazine reported.

Armstrong was fired in 2002 from her Los Angeles web development job for blogging about her company and co-workers, Variety reported. Internet posters characterized her dismissal as “getting dooced.” Her co-workers dubbed her “Dooce” after a typographical error she made while writing the word “dude” in an AOL Instant Messenger chat with friends, according to The New York Times.

“She was a transformative figure not just in the parenting and family space, but in what we now take for granted in terms of the digital ecosystem,” Catherine Connors, a former blogger and the senior vice president of creator experiences at the marketing firm Raptive, told the Post. “She was one of the first well-known bloggers in any category and had an absolutely radical impact when she began writing honestly about motherhood and her mental health issues.”

At the height of its popularity, dooce.com reportedly reached more than 8 million viewers a month and earned her more than $100,000 annually from advertising on the blog, Variety reported. She also was a breakout star, appearing on shows like “Today” and “The Oprah Winfrey Show,” the Times reported.

Armstrong published a memoir in 2009, “It Sucked and then I Cried: How I Had a Baby, a Breakdown and a Much Needed Margarita.”

She also wrote “Dear Daughter: The Best of the Dear Leta Letters“ in 2012 and “The Valedictorian of Being Dead: The True Story of Dying Ten Times to Live” in 2019.

Note: If you or someone you know is thinking of harming themselves, the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline provides free support via the Lifeline by dialing 988. For more about risk factors and warning signs, visit the organization’s official website.

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