Hoda Kotb faced some scary medical decisions while battling breast cancer in 2007.
“I remember after my diagnosis, I went to three other specialists. I had a mastectomy, and one doctor said, ‘You need chemo.’ One said, ‘You don’t need chemo.’ And one said, ‘You can’t make a mistake either way,’” Kotb, 60, recalled on the Wednesday, March 26, episode of her “Making Space” podcast, which marked the podcast’s first episode since her January Today exit. “One person said, ‘You’ll be dead if you don’t do it.’ I couldn’t believe it. I mean, I have chills right now thinking about it.”
Knowing that her cancer wasn’t in her lymph nodes, Kotb said her “decision was clear.” She stated, “I did not do chemotherapy, and it was right for me.”
Though Kotb opted out of chemotherapy, she did undergo a mastectomy and has remained cancer-free since 2007. She opened up about her cancer diagnosis while chatting with podcast guest Elle Macpherson about her own decision not to undergo chemo in favor of holistic treatments.
“There’s been a lot of judgment around my decision. But, you know, I had to live with the decision that I made. Not anybody else,” the model, 60, told Kotb about getting backlash for her health choices. “And it was right for the kind of cancer that I had and for my character and for my body. I felt that very deeply. But the hardest part was the indecision, prior to making the decision. Once I made the decision, then it was just a question of executing the protocols.”
While sharing her secret cancer battle in September 2024, Macpherson told Women’s Weekly that she was in “clinical remission.” On Kotb’s podcast, she noted that she is currently living a “very, very healthy, happy life and lifestyle.”
Kotb went on to recall getting her breast cancer diagnosis while working on Dateline, stating, “After the diagnosis and after the surgery, I literally woke up from my bed, like, in a start,” she shared. “And I [thought], ‘You can’t scare me.’ I was like, ‘What am I afraid of now?’”
She then felt inspired to seek out her fourth hour of Today cohosting gig. “I went to 30 Rock, I hit 52 on the elevator bank, I went up to where those guys are that I’ve never seen because they all sit up there. And I said, ‘I don’t know if you even know me, but let me tell you what happened to me.’ And I went on this whole spiel,” she told listeners. “I go, ‘They’re starting a new hour of the Today show. I want that. I think I could do that.’ He was like kind of looking at me like, ‘What?’”
Three weeks later, Kotb got the gig and began cohosting the fourth hour of Today with Kathie Lee Gifford later that year. “[My cancer diagnosis] unleashed courage and things like, ‘What was I waiting for? Someone to notice me? I’m working at my desk. Are they going to see me? Of course they’re not,’” she noted.
Since leaving Today earlier this year, Kotb has announced her plans to launch a new wellness app and company later this year. She also celebrated the return of her “Making Space” podcast via Instagram. “Lets [sic] get ready!!! New season of #makingspace is here!” she captioned a clip of an ad for her podcast in New York City on Tuesday, March 25.
Important note: “If you are thinking about using an alternative method instead of standard treatment, be sure to talk to your doctor first. It can be a challenge to find trustworthy information about the safety and effectiveness of alternative treatments. Also, some of these treatments can require a lot of time and money, and they may require travel away from your family and friends,” the American Cancer Society cautions on its website. “Choosing alternative treatment instead of mainstream cancer treatments might put you at serious risk. Delays or interruptions in standard treatment can give the cancer more time to grow. Even early stage cancers can become hard to treat successfully if proven treatment is delayed long enough.”
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