Hoda Kotb

welcome to many questions. I've always loved Pruces questionnaire. It was originally an eighteenth century parlor game meant to reveal an individual's true nature. But with so many questions, there wasn't really an opportunity to expand on anything. So I took the format of Pruce's questionnaire and adapted What I think are seven of the most important questions you could ever ask someone. They are when and where were you happiest?

What is the quality you like least about yourself? What relationship, real or fictionalized, defines love for you? What question would you most like answered, What person, place, or experience has shaped you the most? What would be your last meal? And can you tell me something in your life that has grown out of a personal disaster. The more people we ask, the more we begin to see what makes

us similar and what makes us individual. I've gathered a group of really remarkable people who I am honored and humbled to have had a chance to engage with. My guest today is herd a cut b who is really the most surprising and interesting person who we probably already

think we know. I know, I did. She's been the co anchor of The Today Show since two thousand eighteen, been a tireless advocate breast cancer awareness and surviving cancer herself, and became a mother later in her life, which gives her a perspective on motherhood that I found extremely relatable and joyful. Okay, so, like you know these questions, dying to hear what your answers are, What would be your last meal? I've debated this because this is a big

I think I would have Joel's salmon. He barbecued salmon every Saturday, and it is the best samy. It like melts in your mouth and it reminds me of us. So I would have that. I would have really crispy, crunchy, delicious French fries only because for my whole life that's been my comfort food and I would love that I would have my mom's spark lava. I can close my eyes and taste it. She's eighty six and she still makes it, and it's delicious, and it reminds me of

all the goodness in my mom. Reminds me of our kitchen when we were kids. And then would probably eat about three gallons of ice cream because I'm not allowed to eat ice cream because I've got a very role Oh well, that won't matter your dairy problem. Yeah, when I wondered what I want to eat at all, who knows, maybe feel terrible at the end. My club is stocking to Marry. My team is Marry, and she's outside eating

a sandwich. My team is my dog, and he's going to bark definitely in the stocking mirror, and she's like, I just have ice water. Are you to my stomach when I eat? Oh my god, your last meal? Eat it? Yeah. I mean I realized in asking this question that implicit in the question is you know, and then you're gonna die or that's it. It's out and it's like, isn't that what we'd really be thinking about, like what Mary says, like I wouldn't be able to eat a thing. I

would just drink water. I don't know. I think it's that. What is the food that connects you most to life, regardless of whether you're about to die or not. I love food so much. When I speak to people who are like, yeah, you know, it's fuel, I just want to I just want to punch them. Really. One of my favorite desserts is a sheet cake, like a sheet birthday cake. Yeah, I just want to sit on my

couch sometimes because I make them for everybody's birthday. I just want to sit on my couch when it was home. I can't beat myself when people are around with this big spoon and that sheet cake and just sit there and just scoop that up like that would be one of my favorite nights. I just agree with you. There is covert food that is a category of living that

doesn't get enough play. Like I like standing up in my kitchen with a sheet of mozza with really thick, delicious French salted butter and mar might and I like to stand up and listen to the radio and look out at what's happening on the street, total rear window. It with my mom, I and Matza. I've never told anybody that, Hoda, I've never admitted that, but that's what I like to do, and I like to stand up

when I'm doing it. By the way, the covert eating Joel had any idea what I ate when he went out of town and be like, oh god, when the kids go to bed, if Joel's out, chirp and Chicken has a rack of ribs that has all kinds of barbecue. I literally get a roll of paper towels. I sit in front of the TV on the floor. It's gross and I just go for it and I'm like done

with it. And I wanted to dispose of the evidence just in case I've done that special trash bag for food that you don't want anyone to know that you ate. I was imagining that it's a full rack of ribs. It's not even a half rack. Girl. And what I want to do sometimes to stop myself this is t M. I is when I eat enough of the cake and I just have to throw it away. I just have to get cascake and pour it all. Because sometimes sometimes after an hour or so, it was I could bite in.

There have to ruin it so that you can't go back, because if we're sitting on top of the can, it's still okay. Every Woman, every woman I know, except the one who said that food was fuel, understands that pouring

on something to ruin it. Do you remember in the beginning of Alma and Louise, this is great scene where Gina Davis is on the phone with her husband who's being horrible, and she just keeps going to the fridge and she takes out like a Snickers bar and she takes a bite, and she wraps up, and she puts it back in and she goes and does something else, and she eats the whole thing through the whole scene.

And I do that always. I pretend like I'm not going to finish the chocolate bar, the cake, the buns, the ice cream, the mochi, the super thin of the cake, the tiny thin that's my That's what my friend said to me. So dinner, I was like, oh, I'll just have I'll just have a little tiny piece of cake, and she was low, yeah, because you're gonna the rest of the kitchen when everyone else is drinking coffee. She's right,

what person, place, or experience most altered your life? I mean for the better, it was my kids, and probably for the worst was you know. I was said a sorority formal. I was a trying out and my brother who also went to Virginia Tech, he was another fraternity and we were having our formal or whatever. We were dancing and drinking and all the stuff, and my brother runs in and I was like, oh my god. My brother always said he was going to crash trying out formals,

like he gave his buddy did it? And he said come outside, and I said what he goes come outside and he's talked to you, and I go now, I said that you need to tell me and he said Dad had a heart attack and he died. It was like you couldn't even compute what was going on. And I remember we got into a car and we drove to his apartment where he shared with a bunch of

other people, and we laid on the bed. So when I was remembering, and I played James Taylor on the turntable over and over and over and over until we went home that morning. I think, you know, losing him that young, I mean I went without my contacts. I'm legally blind. I had on headphones and I would walk around campus just obliviously for most of the year, I think, and it's funny, it was the worst thing in the world, But I often look around where I am now and wonder.

You know, you always want to add a girl from your dad, you know you always want to you did it, and throughout my career, I think there were probably a few spots where he probably would have said, well, good for you, you did it, and then I would have been done. But instead, when you don't have that at a girl, you're like, I guess there's more of this mountain to climb. Let's see, let's see, let's see. And you may keep pushing yourself for something that isn't coming.

But at the end of the day, it landed me in a beautiful place. Now I have a beautiful family, and you know, all those great things happened as a result of it. So I think that event was really life changing and helped me in some ways, and it left me with unfinished business and others. Like you know, we just were super close. He was closer with my brother and my sister than me. I used to sometimes sit in my car with him and we wouldn't we

wouldn't say anything. I was trying to think something to say, Yeah, I it's so funny. I remember sitting next to my dad at the Academy Awards. It was so amazing that he was there, and my mom was there and my sister, and he's holding my hand as they're reading at the nominees and he leans over and he's like, darling, you're not going to win. And I was like, what, wait do you He's like, yeah, no, you're not going to win. And he was squeezing my hand. He was like, it's okay,

you'll win something else. And it was so funny. I swear to you. I was still chuckling when they read out kim basing his name. I was still laughing. You're just going You've got to be fucking kidding me. But it was so perfect. It was like, that was the attic girl that I needed in that moment. Oh my god, Daddy, in your life, can you tell me about something that has grown out of a personal disaster. Yes, there was a biggie. I was working here at NBC and everything

was great. I worked at Dateline. I was newly married Ladi Dai Da. Life was great. I went for a routine mammogram and she felt something and she said, you should get it checked. So in this weird span of a week, I found out that I needed amystectomy, and at the same time, I found out that the guy who I was married to was being unfaithful, and I literally was like, what is happening? Like what happened? I didn't understand, and I went for surgery and was horrible.

So in that time afterwards, I was in covering, which was just laying around watching Law and Order and trying to figure out what I was matter about the sickness or the soon to be ex husband, And in the middle of all of it, I had this sort of weird epiphany which happens, I think sometimes when everything is crummy, and all of a sudden I realized like I had made it, and I got these four words that sort of came to me, and they were you can't scare me.

And I learned at work they were starting a new hour of the Today Show, a fourth hour, and I did something I had never done before I've never really liked, raised my hand and said picked me for this job, because here's why I'm so good. I just worked really hard. I was like, seeing you over here, I'm the one working. Hey, if you want to promote me, I'm over here, like I was that one, not the one who strung themselves with Christmas lights and talked about how good they were.

So in this moment, with that epiphany and that feeling I was having, I said, you know what, I'm gonna go ask for that effing job. And I still remember. I got me elevator of thirty rock and went to the fifty second floor, which was all the way up, and I walked into Jeff Zupper's office at the time he was heading up NBC, and I said, Jeff, I had this epiphany. I got better. You can't scare me. I want this job. He was like, okay, you are who are you againt He had been through brain cancer,

so he understood that feeling of unstoppability kind of. And I finished my speech. My heart was pounding. I did it. I'd never done that. People saw me as a dateline person. I was an Afghanistan and I had a couple of producers pulling for me, and I ended up getting that damn job. And I thought to myself Oh my god. If I hadn't gotten sick, I wouldn't have the guts, like I wouldn't have had the courage. I wouldn't have had the mojo. I wouldn't have gone up. I would

have never asked. I would have waited like I usually do. But instead it was urgent, like my life had margins. There was a beginning and an end, like stop wasting time. Like that hit me. It was like all of a sudden, life was urgent, and that happened. I ended up getting it, and I thought, well, talk about the silver lining of a yucky, horrible, terrible couple of years turned into a job that turned into another job. I mean, I can't even believe I'm fifty six and I'm doing the today,

Like how did that happen? Like how did it happen? I'm still stunned even now as I sit in my office wondering, like, Wow, that was weird, but I think that was it. And going through the divorce and a sickness and going through two things at once, it's like, you can it really pile all your sadness in one place. You've got to split it. Maybe that helps you in a weird way, like I'm mad at him. Why am I sick? You know? Then I'm like I'm feeling better. What a jump, you know, And so all of a

sudden you're like, oh, okay, well here I am. I think I made it through. Wow. God, I wish when the really bad, hard stuff was happening that concurrent with fair and worry and fair and worry could be this idea that I know something's going to grow out of this. I know that this is not for nothing. It's funny that we can look back and we can see that, but at the time when it's happening. It was astonishes me that we can't comfort ourselves with, well, it's most

likely going to happen, which is, as he said, something grows. Yes, yeah, you're right. I would have loved to have known in the middle of all those days, like, don't worry, there's something coming, because then you realize, like, you're only here for a minute, So you do you that's it, that's all. You get. One right around the sun, so you can tiptoe around and make everyone feel better and do what you do, or you can speak it, say it out

loud kind of thing. What relationship, real or fictionalized defines love for you. I had to think about this one for a while. I have a best friend who I've known for twenty years. Her name is Karen. She met her husband in New Orleans. We we both lived there and he was a police officer. She's a reporter, and it was a beautiful romance. And over the years I watched that relationship and I was always in awe that

because it worked on all cylinders. It worked as a partnership, as a romantic relationship, they connected in all the ways, and I hadn't seen many relationship that worked everywhere. Usually it's like, well this is from friends, and this is for my husband. And it seemed like they had a connection that worked everywhere. And he got very very ill a couple of years ago, and sadly he passed away.

And it was really since his passing that I watched Karen speak about the love she has for him in this moment, and I was so struck by the depth. I knew it was deep, but I think it was watching her number one go to hospital room after hospital room for years and years, writing notes, writing notes, writing notes, talking to doctors, another doctor. I have to follow up, I have to call back why aren't they doing this? What's up with the insurance? It was endless, endless. She

was there. She was always there, And I flew to MD Anderson a few times just to be there with them. And I walked in and she was always determined and driven and had that look. And meantime she was flying priests in to talk to John. And she's probably like the most selfless person I've ever met, and the kindest. And they have a daughter who's graduating high school, and there's a lot that's happening in that world. Yet here she is, you know, speaking about the love of her husband,

and it was underscore. And two weeks ago I was asking her this question about a priest who had come to visit John when he was ill, and he was from India, and I said, whatever happened to Father Balla this priest who came and is he okay in India with everything that's going on with COVID? And she said, well, he's in a remote area. Said you know, they're building a church there, and I said, oh wow, that's terrific. Shees she said they should have to walk five miles,

but now they're building one in their community. I said, how did they do that? That's great? She said, well, they just got the you know, all the equipment and things that they needed and they built it. And I said, oh, that's great. And she said, you know, some of the equipment could be expensive, but anyway, they got it. And I said how did they? How did they get all that equipment and things to build a church? And she

they they just got it. And I said, please tell me how they got it and she said, supplies are inexpensive, and the dollar goes a long way. And I looked at her and I said, okay, I said, did you and she doesn't ever say And then she said her husband's name is John long Quillow and she said, oh, they called it the John Renquillow Church. Oh my goodness, I thought, like the depth of first of all, her humility is beyond my comprehension. She'll never tell you she's

done something good. She probably regrets that she told me that story because she doesn't like to share that she's doing something. She just does things. You know, she'll give everything away and not mention it. She selflessly and with great humility, helped this community build a church. She didn't want to mention it, and they because they loved John called it the John Lonquillo Church, because she always says he's as close to a saying that she can emagine.

Do you think that devotion and selflessness others the cornerstones of love? Well, that's beautiful that you put it that way. I guess I feel like I see it personified in people, but I guess I've never broken it down. But yeah, the depth is more than a wee click, more than we have a lot in common, more than I can tell him things, you know. There's a depth there that I think is rare. I don't think everyone gets to

experience that kind of relationship. And he John on Sundays, he would go off in the morning, and she said, I don't know what he's doing, probably running, you know, and etcetera, etcetera. She didn't learn until years later that he was always stopping at this older woman's house to sit with her. Her husband died and that was one of his stops in the morning. But he didn't talk about it. He just did it. And I said, well,

I think John's probably a saint. You are too, I just know, But saints don't say funk, so I couldn't be. I thought, will the cool saints say fuck? But anyway, it just struck me to watch that and they have this young daughter and just I'm watching her and listen. It doesn't always shake out the way that you think it should in quotes, and it sounds like that young woman, what she has had, what she has seen of love, and what she has experienced of devotion is irreplaceable and

will be with her forever. And it's not that one should ever have an either or like either you have a dad or you have this amazing example of devotion and love. But but how incredible that she does have that, and that that's his legacy. It's very hard when you lose someone to think about legacies because you really just you don't care. You're like, I don't care about the legs. I just want them here. I want them here to hug and to touch and to feel and to be

with and to talk to. But the reality is, if they've played their hand and it's done, what is left behind them is really genuinely what you celebrate. Right, Yeah, that's good. Yeah, So tell me when and when were you happiest. I'm my happiest in this moment. And the reason I say that is because I've had so many beautiful moments in my life, but nothing comes close to what happened to me four years ago where Joe and

I adopted Haley. And I think, when you don't think you're going to get something because you don't know why it wasn't in your cards. And I always dreamt of being a mom. I thought it was in my d n A. I had some bumps in the road, a divorce and an illness, and then you realize, We'll wait. I think the window went past me, and you almost are shocked, like what happened? How did I miss that window?

So I would say out loud, all I wanted to do was be a school teacher, and I would say, so, I'm done with this job at the Today Show, I'm going to be a school teacher, because it was the closest I could get to being with kids. And I was actually thinking about, like, how do I get my education degree? I don't have that. What do I do? How do I do it? And then one day I actually watched a video and it was a child in Syria.

The place had been bombed and he had soot on his face, and I just I was struggling with it. And I looked at that kid and I said, oh my god, what I wouldn't do to be the mother to that child. And that was like the final sign. There were so many signs before, but I think that was the sign. And I said, if God tells you something, pay attention. Stop turning your head, stop saying not now,

stop saying it's too late, stop stops up. And so I approached the guy who had been dating for I don't know six months, who has a grown daughter, and I was like, how am I gonna say this? And I guess this will show me whether or not he loves me enough. And I said to him, I'm gonna ask you something that's very important to me, but I don't want you to answer right now. I need you to think about it. And I said, I have these

feelings that I cannot push away anymore. And that's it, Like I have to say it out loud or I'll explode. You know that feeling when you you're carrying something it's heavy. I really do. And I said, I would like to explore adoption with you, and literally it was like one thousand, two thousand three. I was looking at his face and I was thinking to myself in this weird five second vacuum,

everything was about to change everything. Either I was going to think maybe he doesn't love me enough and maybe this was over, or he was going to say yes and our lives would change in another way. And he literally, meaning maybe. On the second number five, he said to me, oh, I don't need a week. I don't need any time to think about it. The answers yes, and I literally fell on his chest and stabbed because it was like, finally I said it out loud. You know the thing

you're most scared of, say that loud. In either way it's resolved, you might as well say it. And literally I just saw it like I still saw the mess earri scenes on his teacher. I was like that kind of starving. But anyway, that was the beginning. Wow, So you would have done it anyway if that had meant the end of your relationship. You would have chosen being a mother over being in a relationship with someone that

you loved. It was that important to you. I never actually never thought about because I didn't have to make the choice. But yes, it's the most extraordinary thing when you know something, you just know. When I was pregnant with Henry. They do this terrible but I suppose necessary test where they basically look at the DNA from your partner and yours mixed together, and it spits out a number of the likelihood of you having a child with disabilities, and it gives you a X number in X thousand.

And I wasn't in the thousands. I wasn't in the hundreds. I was in the teens, like it was very likely. And I wrestled with the idea of getting an amniocentesis because I was like, I'm having this baby no matter what. I had the amnia because I was like, I will be forewarned, I will know. And I was like, I'm having this baby. I'm having this baby no matter what. And I knew it. I knew it as clear as a bell. There's very few moments in life where we're

that sure about things clearly. You're right is when you know without a blink, when you know and you know what's so weird. I'm you know, as I'm sitting here in my office, I was sitting in the chair that you can't see it's behind you. When the adoption agency texted me and I called it the project, because I really wanted to look at my phone when it rang and said that project Ashley, and she wrote called me and I looked at the bolts and I was like, oh my god. So I literally sat there to get

a yellow pad and I looked at the clock. It's like eleven fifty three. I said, this is the moment. Like this, there will always be like a before and after. And I scribbled all that stuff down and then I hit the button and I called her and she said two words, she's here. I was like, I don't know what a live birth feels like, but that was pretty cool. When I just got there, it was pretty amazing. And it was one of those times Dan still everything's frozen.

It's like your life changes in a blink, like just like that, and there's a before and after. How long was it from the beginning of the process to that phone call. We got the call in January and I had talked to Joel in November. Wow, we had just moved in together. It was November. Because they said it could take a year, as aid a joy at me, take some time, and I was like, it's actually not take you the time. It's just like when it happens. It happens. You know your life is about to take

a crazy turn. It was very quick, how amazing? Gosh, well that is that was you? You you're sitting there with your yellow legal pad. Was me waiving the pregnancy test? Just you know, there's a before and an asked at this moment of like you you don't know? And then oh my god, you know were you excited right away? Oh my god, I was. I've been told I couldn't have children. I've been told when I was very young. This this pretty awful doctor. You know, I'm eighteen years old.

And he basically compared all my tubes and my uterus is basically sort of looking like a you bend in a toilet, and he was like, chances of you having a child extremely unscreamed, unlike I would say I'll never have a child. And I was like, well, is there like anything, is there anything I could do? So anything I can do? Like you know, I'm eighteen, I'm sitting there in my paper gown open at the back, and he goes, well, you know, you could have a lot

of sex, and so if you shake something loose. I I just remember stumbling out of there being like this is no you know, nobody, nobody helps you deal with that concept. But it's interesting how you're you know, we didn't have I mean, I say, back then, you and I are kind of around the same age, but it wasn't like there was a therapist or someone to really talk to about this huge idea. Your life sort of

grows around it. So when things change when I became pregnant, or I imagine when you get this call that you are actually going to be a mother, like it is actually going to happen to say, it's life changing. I don't know if there are times words don't really they don't really suffice, but it was epic and immense, and it definitely made me feel like there was some greater power at work. I feel like I should pay you

for a therapy session. You can, I'll send you my papal information, or you can just do a direct transfer. I'd like that. Hold It's been such an incredible pleasure talking to you. Thank you so much. I'm sorry you crowd your mascara. That's okay, so great. Thank you. You can watch Holda every weekday on the Today Show, and she will also be co anchoring the Tokyo Olympics from

July to August eight. Mini Questions is hosted and written by Me Mini Driver, Supervising producer Aaron Kaufman, Producer Morgan Lavoy, Research assistant Marissa Brown. Original music Sorry Baby by Mini Driver, Additional music by Aaron Kaufman, Executive produced by Me Minni Driver. Special thanks to Jim Nikolay, Will Pearson, Addison No Day, Lisa Castella and Nick Oppenheim at w kPr, de La Pescadore, Kate Driver and Jason Weinberg, and for constantly solicited tech support, Henry Driver,