Hoda Kotb returned to Today on Monday (March 6th) and explained why she was absent from the show for two weeks. Kotb shared that her daughter Hope had been hospitalized due to an undisclosed health issue.
"My youngest, Hope, was in the ICU for and then in the hospital for a little over a week," Kotb told cohost Savannah Guthrie. "I'm so grateful she's home, she is back home. I was waiting for that day to come, and we are watching her closely."
Kotb also commented on how much she appreciated hospital staff during this difficult time. "You know what I realized too, Savannah? It's like, when your child is ill, the amount of gratitude you can have for people who helped you out," she said. "I'm grateful for the doctors at Weill Cornell who were amazing and the nurses. And I'm grateful for my family and I'm grateful to friends like you who were there every single day. So I want to say thank you for that. I love you."
Guthrie replied, "I love you too. You have a lot of friends out there. We are right there with you, lifting you up and holding you. So let's do this."