Hoda Kotb is sharing new details about her 6-year-old daughter Hope’s health struggles — and how they played a part in her decision to leave Today.
In an interview with People published on Wednesday, May 28, Kotb, 60, revealed that Hope was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes. “It’s kind of constant care for Hope. We’re monitoring her 24/7,” she shared before calling Hope a “trooper” for having to deal with insulin injections and blood sugar monitoring.
“She was getting shots — four or five a day — every day for a year. Now she is getting them less frequently because we have some other means to get her what she needs, but there’s a lot to it,” Kotb explained. “Some kids can have sweets and she can’t. If she’s up in the night, we have to take care of her at night.”
Despite her health struggles, Kotb said Hope is a “happy, healthy, rambunctious, amazing kid, and we have to watch her.” She added, “Diabetes is a part of her, but not all of her. I hope it shapes her but never defines her.”
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Hope’s Type 1 diabetes diagnosis played a role in her decision to step away from Today earlier this year. “I really wanted to and needed to be here to watch over her. So, whenever she needs anything, and it can happen at night, multiple times, I’m up — I’m up up up,” Kotb told the outlet. “But I would never, ever want Hope to one day grow up and say, ‘Oh, my mom left her job because [of me].’ It wasn’t that alone. But if you look at it cumulatively, it was a part of that decision.”
Post-Today, Kotb joked that her kids have a “split verdict” about her working on her new wellness brand, Joy 101, from home. “I think that on some days they love it and sometimes I think I might be cramping their style a little bit, because they were used to a morning routine minus me,” she quipped. “I still feel like I’m learning how to be a calmer mother, and I want to be that mom for them, so I’m still a work in progress there.”
Kotb — who shares Hope and daughter Haley, 8, with her ex-fiancé, Joel Schiffman — previously took a weeks-long absence from Today in early 2023 due to a family health matter. Upon her return to the NBC morning show that March, she revealed the reason behind her hiatus was because Hope had been hospitalized in the ICU.
“I’m so grateful she’s home,” Kotb said on air at the time, not specifying details of her daughter’s condition. “I was waiting for that day to come. And we are watching her closely. I’m just so happy.”
Kotb opened up about Hope’s hospitalization for the first time in March 2024. “Any parent who’s been through a scary thing with their child understands. It’s like you just can’t believe that your child’s sick,” she shared in an interview with People. “You can’t believe that there’s nothing you can do. You can’t believe that no matter what you do, you can’t will it away or protect her, or all the things that we’re supposed to be doing as parents. And it’s a position I’ve never found myself in.”
Kotb told the outlet she didn’t want Hope to “get labeled” because of her medical condition, stating, “She’s a kid who is so vibrant, and most days everything is totally fine. I don’t want people to look at her differently.”
Kotb noted that she wouldn’t “put my worry on [Hope],” as it is “too much for a kid to carry.” She also credited her family’s faith for being a sense of strength during their difficult time.
“I look at her, and I think, ‘Wow, you blossomed into this incredible kid who is so resilient and well-equipped for her whole life despite this stuff that has happened to her,’” Kotb said of her youngest. “She just demonstrates that when you have whatever she has inside of her, this will, this fight, this everything … she can withstand anything. This child is going to have the easiest adulthood because she’s had a tough go of it early on.”
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Not long after she and her girls moved out of New York City and into the suburbs, Kotb revealed that Hope was “thriving” in an October 2024 interview with People. “She is improving, we’re watching her, and I think that as time goes on, we’ll have a better handle on it, but we’re already seeing great differences,” she said. “We have really excellent care, I have people who are helping us out. I feel like she is finding steady footing.”
Both Haley and Hope were by Kotb’s side during her final episode of Today on January 10. Kotb shared sweet new photos of herself and her kids in celebration of Mother’s Day earlier this month. “Happy mothers day from our family to yours xoxoxo,” she captioned Instagram pics from their family’s holiday brunch.
