Nara Smith: Stop Calling Me a Tradwife

Nara Smith joins Alex Cooper on Call Her Daddy to discuss her journey from creating cooking videos during COVID to becoming a major social media influencer. She explains that her viral content originated from necessity—managing an autoimmune disease and eczema led her to cook from scratch, and she began posting TikTok videos while wearing couture dresses in her kitchen, initially to avoid waking her sleeping children with her normal voice. This evolved into a full-scale business where she films, edits, selects recipes and outfits, and does voiceovers entirely herself.

A significant portion of the conversation addresses the 'tradwife' label that has followed Nara throughout her career. She explicitly rejects this characterization, going through point-by-point how she doesn't fit the definition: she's a working mother who travels frequently for business, splits childcare 50/50 with her husband Lucky, cooks as a passion rather than obligation, and both she and Lucky work and provide for their family. She expresses frustration that people put women in narrow boxes to understand them, arguing that women should be able to exist in multiple spaces simultaneously without being pigeonholed. She notes that some people refuse to be corrected about this narrative regardless of evidence.

Nara discusses how sharing her life online has forced her to set boundaries around her children's privacy after experiencing disturbing incidents where old photos of her daughter were shared without consent and attracted inappropriate comments from adults online. She now limits what she posts about her children's faces and carefully curates what she shares.

The conversation shifts to deeply personal territory when discussing her daughter Whimsy's cancer diagnosis. Nara describes finding out about the illness after returning from a family photo shoot, taking Whimsy to the pediatrician, and ultimately receiving a diagnosis of cancer that had spread throughout her daughter's body. She details how the family navigated treatment—Lucky primarily stayed overnight at the hospital during five-day chemotherapy cycles while Nara managed the other three children at home and continued working. She describes the initial postpartum period with her youngest daughter Fonny as exceptionally difficult, experiencing severe postpartum anxiety, depersonalization, and intrusive thoughts that made her feel disconnected from reality for weeks. She didn't initially share Whimsy's diagnosis publicly but eventually did so after Whimsy entered remission, hoping to create community and help other families feel less alone.

Nara discusses her marriage to Lucky, whom she married at 18 and had her first child with at 19. She credits couples therapy with giving them communication tools that proved invaluable during Whimsy's illness. She emphasizes that Lucky is her best friend and that their partnership strengthened rather than fractured under the stress of their daughter's cancer treatment.

She explores her childhood, noting her parents had a tumultuous marriage that taught her little about healthy conflict resolution, and she's been intentionally unlearning patterns from her upbringing. She wants to instill curiosity in her children, inspired by her father's globe game and book-based learning approach.

Nara discusses her new cookbook 'Homemade,' coming out October 13th, which includes both elaborate from-scratch recipes (like homemade Oreos, Cheez-Its, and cereal) and practical everyday meals. She explains the cookbook took years to develop and represents a labor of love. It includes stories and isn't purely instructional. She mentions that many recipes, while from-scratch, are accessible to home cooks rather than professionals—she describes herself as a home cook who started cooking when she began posting on TikTok, learning through trial and error.

The interview concludes with discussion of her future plans, including acting classes, building her own brand, and exploring television opportunities. She emphasizes her gratitude for her community and her desire to celebrate women who are multifaceted and thriving in multiple areas of life.