Hello lovey humans,

Some chapters arrive quietly, others arrive with a punch in the gut. This is Julie Hogan’s story.

Writing the Book She Couldn’t Find

Julie Devaney Hogan had always intended to write. She just assumed it would happen someday. We've all said it, "after the career winds down" or "after the kids are older." She had student loans, priorities, a fast-moving career in tech. Writing could wait.

Then, in late 2022, cancer changed the timeline.

Deep into a high-velocity career as a tech executive that included leadership roles at HubSpot, Drift, Toast, and Medallion, Julie was diagnosed with Stage 3 HER2+ breast cancer at 37 while raising three young children. She fought it hard. She wrote about it beautifully — essays for TODAY and Newsweek that cracked open conversations millions of parents hadn’t known how to start. A year cancer-free felt like a miracle. Then, in May 2025, the cancer returned with a punch. Now Stage 4, and now with brain metastases. The prognosis: weeks to months.

Julie’s response? She started writing faster.

Permission to Laugh

As a mother living with terminal cancer, Julie noticed something missing from the shelves. There were plenty of books about grief. They covered the topics you'd expect, the tears, the heaviness, the goodbyes. But grief, as Julie well knows, isn’t only that. Grief and laughter co-exist. They show up in the same afternoon. Cry-laughing is a requirement to grief.

She couldn’t find a children’s book that told kids the full truth: that it’s still okay to laugh. So she wrote one.

“I am dying, and my biggest fear is my kids won’t know how to navigate grief and joy, so I wrote this book for my family — and to help other families with young kids who might be looking for permission to laugh again, even with heavy grief.”

Her book, It’s Still OK to Laugh, cuts straight to the heart of it regardless of the kind of loss. It gets right to the point that often goes unsaid, especially in families like Julie’s own: Boston-Irish-Italian, where grief is handled quietly and life resumes as normal after a funeral. Julie is deliberately choosing a different path. She calls it cycle breaking. She's intentionally preparing how she wants her children cared for, emotionally armed with the full truth that joy doesn’t betray the people we love.

Love That Inspires

When Julie first got sick, her husband Dave — her childhood love, did something no one expected. He picked up a paintbrush. Dave had never shown any particular interest in art; Julie jokes with affection that he definitely wasn’t paying attention in art class. But something poured out of him, something unexpected and beautiful. He launched Studio Wavelength, began sharing his work quietly, and transformed in front of her eyes.

Watching Dave’s courage and his willingness to share something so private gave Julie the push she needed to pursue her own. His encouragement was, characteristically, blunt and direct: “Then make it happen.”

She did. She launched a website, an Instagram handle, and began writing with purpose. What had been tucked away for later became the work of right now.

An Accelerated Life

Julie describes her life now as “accelerated.” Home full time with her three children (ages 6, 9, and 11) writing while they’re at school. Documenting everything. Printing photos. Writing letters. Tucking handwritten notes into recipe cards. She jokes that she’s living her accelerated coastal-grandma life, creating the artifacts she imagined passing down to grandchildren, but for her own kids, now.

She is filling every day with intention. Appreciating each moment. The ocean she loves, the outdoors, time with friends and family, and the work of a writer who finally stopped waiting for the right moment.

Julie also serves on the board of the Know Your Lemons Foundation, advancing breast cancer awareness and education, and is the founder of Season for Squeezin — born from the way she discovered her own cancer, changing in and out of a bathing suit at the beach.

This Is What Second Harvest Looks Like

Julie’s story is not one most of us would choose. But what she is doing with it with creativity and fierce love. She is the very definition of a Second Harvest. Not pretending things are fine. But choosing to create something meaningful — a book, a body of writing, a legacy of laughter — because it matters. Because the window is shorter than you’d like.

She couldn’t find the book she needed. So she wrote it. That, in its purest form, is authorship — of her work, her story, and the next chapter she is writing for the people she loves most.

You can follow Julie at @juliehoganwrites on Instagram and read more of her work at JulieHoganWrites.com. Her children’s book It’s Still OK to Laugh is forthcoming. You can also learn more about the Know Your Lemons Foundation at knowyourlemons.com and Season for Squeezin at seasonforsqueezin.org.

More stories like this soon.

— Richard & Devon

​
​