Today Show host Hoda Kotb recently announced the adoption of her second child, Hope Catherine.
Her daughters’ names – Hope and Haley Joy – reflect the difficult journey to motherhood that the Today Show host faced.
After battling cancer and dealing with divorce, becoming a mother seemed impossible for the American-Egyptian broadcaster. But Hope and Joy prevailed.
Parenthood Brings Hoda Kotb Hope and Joy
After undergoing a double mastectomy, reconstructive surgery, and chemo in 2007, Kotb learned she could not have biological children.
For a time, the successful broadcaster and day show host accepted this. But eventually, she told her long-term boyfriend, Joel Schiffman, that she intended to adopt. He agreed immediately.
Welcoming Haley into the family brought such joy that Kotb made that her middle name.
“I understand my purpose. I understand why I’m on this earth,” she says. “All of a sudden, the most exciting part of the day is after work when I’m holding her. Not when I’m interviewing someone, even if it’s Beyoncé!”
Hoda Kotb: We Are Multifaceted
Parenthood may be the most important thing to Kotb now, but the broadcaster will never be defined by just one thing.
“We are multifaceted,” she says. “I like hard news, I like knowing that stuff – but I also like this other part of me. It’s like, I watch 60 Minutes, I read People magazine.” But appreciating the diverse aspects of herself did not come easily.
Growing up, Kotb’s Egyptian heritage caused her to feel out of place, not quite one thing or the other. She had to learn to embrace that multifaceted person. “I wasn’t black or white to the kids in school, yet I seemed to be both and neither,” she recalls.
But those days are long gone, and the broadcast icon embraces multiple identities: as a parent, an Egyptian-American, a breast cancer survivor, a journalist, and more.
Kotb’s Journey Overcoming Rejection
Achieving success on a brand-name national TV show took a long time. Kotb recalls a trip seeking TV work in which she received twenty-seven rejections in just ten days.
But she decided to make one last stop on her way home, in a small studio in Greenville, Missouri. Rather than glancing at her audition tape and sending her packing, the station manager hired her on the spot.
She looks back on that night as a defining moment in her life. “You just need one person to believe in you,” she says. “So if you love something enough, find that one person who’s gonna allow you to go down that road.”
Now, Kotb believes that all of her hardships and struggles -from reporting in war zones to divorce and breast cancer – led her to where she is now, loving mother of two beautiful daughters..
“You think that you’re full,” she says. “That’s exactly how I felt with Haley, and Joel, and everything…but my heart just grew three times. It’s amazing.”
