It’s been more than 20 years since Al Roker underwent gastric bypass surgery, but he still remembers what his father told him that inspired his weight loss journey.
“To be honest, I struggled with my weight for most of my adult life,” Roker, 70, told People in an interview published on Monday, January 6. “And my dad had gotten very ill, and at one point toward the end, he made me promise that I was going to get in shape.”
The promise and his father’s blunt words changed the Today show correspondent’s life forever.
“He said, point-blank, ‘Look, we both know I’m not going to be here to help you raise your kids. You’ve got to be here for your children,’” Roker recalled of his father’s final warning. “And that really stuck with me, and that led me to do a gastric bypass.”
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Roker underwent gastric bypass surgery in March 2002, at the time weighing 340 pounds. By the end of that year, he had lost 100 pounds.
The beloved Today cohost revealed in his 2013 memoir, Never Goin’ Back: Winning the Weight Loss Battle for Good, that he gained 40 pounds after the death of his mother in 2011. However, he managed to slim down to 205 pounds by 2012.
“I used to use travel as an excuse to eat poorly. Now I don’t go anywhere without my scale; I literally pack it with me,” Roker told Parade in December 2012. “It gives me permission to have a bad day, or even just a bad moment. In the old days it was, ‘Well, I’ve blown it; I may as well just go hog wild.’ Now it’s [like], ‘OK, I made a mistake, let’s get back on the wagon.’”
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Twenty years after the surgery, Roker is still celebrating his health journey. He shared a photo of his 54-size Levi jeans that he wore when he arrived at the hospital, writing via Instagram in March 2022, “It’s still a struggle but I’m never going back.”
The weatherman, who says he now tries to stay around the 190-pound mark, revealed, “I have setbacks and struggle every day, but I never forget how far I’ve come.”
Roker’s fitness journey has also been thwarted at times because of other health struggles. In September 2020, he was diagnosed with prostate cancer. After undergoing surgery to remove his prostate, lymph nodes and some surrounding tissue, Roker was considered cancer-free. His Prostate-Specific Antigen (PSA) levels dropped below 1 as a result of the surgery, which means it’s technically undetectable.
Two years later, Roker had another health scare that resulted in him missing three weeks of work on the Today show. He explained in November 2022 that he was admitted to the hospital for a blood clot in his leg. According to a social media post shared by Roker at the time, “some clots” were sent into his lungs.
Roker ultimately needed surgery to fix the blood clots and was readmitted to the hospital several days later as a result of complications. He later shared that the surgeons found two bleeding ulcers and removed his gallbladder.
He remained at home, recovering through the end of 2022. Roker returned to the NBC broadcast in January 2023.
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“Al’s recent hospitalization was very scary. [He] counts himself so lucky to have gotten speedy treatment and knows that ultimately, he’s lucky to be alive,” a source exclusively told Us Weekly at the time. “He’s been so brave throughout this, never complaining or feeling overly sorry for himself, always wanting to know how others are doing even when he’s at his lowest. Right now, he’s following all the doctors’ advice.”
Since his most recent health scare, Roker has refocused on his wellness journey. This month he became the Chief Motivation Officer for the Start Today fitness app, produced by the Today show.
The app allows followers to get meal plans, daily motivation tips, fitness challenges and more wellness assistance in one place.
