by Hoda Kotb
ANN (softly): Are you mourning the loss of your old self?
I instantly thought, What?! She was asking me questions out loud that I was avoiding in my head. And I agreed to this? I remember thinking, I should not be doing this. This is too soon. But it was too late. There I was, putting my business out there. And not just public-figure business like “I have two dogs and sometimes they sleep under the covers with me.” This was painful stuff, close to the heart.
ANN:
So, you’re mourning a couple of things. You’re mourning the loss of what was your body.
ME:
Yeah. Some days I’m in the shower and I’m like, Jesus. My God. I’m so upset. And some days I’m thinking, Hold on a second. You got your life back. And if this is the scar that shows it, y’know, embrace it.
ANN:
You’re mourning the fact that you, you know, how you’re thinking who you once were, that sort of carefree girl is gone.
ME:
Uh-huh. Yeah.
ANN:
But on the other hand, you got something great back.
ME:
Yes. I feel different. I feel better than I felt. I feel stronger than I felt.
ANN:
Based on what the doctors are telling you, you’ll never have children.
ME:
Not have them—right.
ANN:
Because of this.
ME:
Right. I will not be able to have children that way because of this. And that’s hard. I mean, I can’t even—I can’t even open that door. Like, I can’t even go down that road. But, I keep thinking, you know, life is about options and choices. There will be other options. I’m sure there are a lot of . . . there’s probably some child out there for me somewhere that needs me.
This videotaped interview ran as part of our live segment on the Today show in October for Breast Cancer Awareness month. There I was on the couch with Ann, live in studio with no chance to edit anything. We ran the taped segment we shot earlier, then came back out live to just the two of us. When the red lights lit atop the in-studio cameras, I almost instantly began blubbering. Barely in control of my tear ducts or my voice, I choked out the story of the man on the plane.
What was happening?
That couch was normally where I laughed and joked, but here I was crying with Ann on live TV! It was a hard couple of minutes. She handled the conversation beautifully and steered me in the right direction, while I was blinded by my own personal baggage flying around everywhere. Uncomfortable, naked, exposed—that’s just not me. And the worst part was that everyone was looking at me with Poor You eyes. It was my own fault! By the end of the segment, I felt uneasy, but unbeknownst to (poor) me, something incredible was happening outside the studio walls. Within minutes, emails began to come in from women across the country:
I, too, am a breast cancer survivor. Thank you so much for telling us about yourself. Somehow hearing it from you makes me feel not quite so alone.
Pat
I was diagnosed with breast cancer in June. I am grateful to you for going public because I think you can be instrumental in finding the cure with your very public place on the Today show.
Nan
Thank you, thank you, thank you! I just finished watching your interview. You touched my heart and opened my eyes to the very real possibility of facing breast cancer. I am scheduling my very overdue mammogram this morning. You have helped more than you will ever know.
Karen
I celebrated my fifth year in remission this past August. I was diagnosed at age thirty-five—I’ll be forty-one in November and happy and (cross my fingers) healthy. The biggest thing I’ve learned is to smash my own spiders and get on with my day. There will be another!
Patti
My mother is a two-time survivor of breast cancer, as is my sister-in-law. Despite this, I have been too busy to make my mammogram appointment—moving, changing jobs, etc. When I saw your segment, I jumped up off the couch and ran to the phone. Staying alive needs no excuse. Thank you, thank you, thank you.
Mary Jo
Thank you for sharing that young, seemingly healthy people can be struck by cancer. Many people think it is only a disease of older age and postmenopausal women. You will inspire many younger women to be screened, I am sure. Everyone always thinks there is a tomorrow and doesn’t realize there may not be. Thank you also for sharing the personal details, as the disfigurement part of our disease is a huge part of the battle. Thank you for saying if they are the scars to be alive, then great! That’s a new way of looking at all my scars when I just feel so ugly because of them. Best wishes!
Jane Doe
I do not have cancer and it is not in my family. But I am a survivor of rape, and today thanks to your words, I can go another day. You said that someone on a plane told you not to be selfish with your journey and I immediately started crying because my journey has been painful, at least I thought so before today. Thank you so much for sharing your journey, it gave me courage to share mine. Women survivors are a special breed. I love you for what you did today! God bless you.
Dionne
Thank you, Hoda! I’m thirty-nine and will schedule my first mammogram today because of you. You’re so brave. Thank you. Thank you. Forward!!
Kristen
Thank you for making me cry . . . and making me feel vulnerable for just those few moments. Those moments are the ones that keep me aware and human!
Cindy
I celebrated my tenth year as a survivor. You have joined a sorority that none of us wants to join; however, we are connected for a lifetime. We are sisters, and our energy helps to support those going through just as you have gone through.
RJA
I was blown away by the generous and honest responses that came flooding in. It hit me right then that telling my story on the Today show was a game changer. Originally, I thought there would be no next step. This would be the hard part—reliving my story—and then I could recoil into relative privacy about it. I was so wrong. What I thought was the end was actually the beginning. These incredible emails were just the beginning of a “sisterhood,” as RJA put it. And the sisterhood has a huge family tree—with brothers, fathers, mothers, boyfriends, girlfriends, and millions of other members who are touched by breast cancer. On the streets of New York, people started to grab me, hug me, and say, “June 5, 2000. That’s when I found out about mine.” Or, “Hoda, my sister had it and you are going to be fine.”
I was now the Girl with Breast Cancer.
I’ll never forget, just two days after the Today show story aired, I flew to Virginia to speak at a Virginia Tech fundraiser. As I was walking around talking to people, several older men came up to me and said, “How ya doin’?” (Picture them all looking down at my boobs as they were asking.)
I thought, Don’t you mean, “How are they doin’?” Good Lord, this was a new phenomenon. I was like, “Up here, Poppie (two fingers V-ed at my eyes). Keep it up here.”
Several weeks later, I was walking on the beach with my mom in Delaware when a guy walked right up and said, “Hey, Hoda, my wife had breast cancer, too! How you feelin’?”
That’s just how it was going to be from now on. And it was okay with me.
I have to say, I do feel a bit undeserving of all the attention about it. I feel unworthy to say “I went through this” when so many people have gone through much more than I did. No radiation for me, no chemotherapy for me. I did not lose my hair, I have never (knock wood) relapsed. Countless survivors have had to survive so much more than I. All I can do is focus on the fact that perhaps I have a platform to do something about it.
And here’s what I feel that something is: Look at me, see how healthy I am now. I was weak, but now I’m strong. Clearly, there are legions of women like me who’ve gone through what I have and are living stronger and better. But they don’t have a platform. Maybe I can be their humble representative. My hope is that if someone is totally in the weeds, l
ike I was, they can see there is a path out. If someone feels despair, I want them to feel hope that life can get better. I’m always grateful when someone stops me to say, “You look good. You look like you’re having fun. I can’t believe you had cancer.” Let’s make this clear—I don’t fancy myself as some sort of Pink Pioneer. So many before me with bigger platforms have done the same thing. Brave survivors we all know made it infinitely easier for me to come forward. Olivia Newton-John, Jaclyn Smith, Linda Ellerbee, Sheryl Crow, Melissa Etheridge, Christina Applegate, and on and on and on. The days are long gone when breast cancer was viewed as a broken wing. Now it seems more of a reason to take flight and soar!
One of the questions I’m often asked by people now is, “How can I help someone I love who’s battling breast cancer?”
My answer is this: “Don’t look at ’em funny.” You know what I’m talking about—the Look. For me, one of the worst emotions I can have directed my way is pity. Sad eyes. Eyes that say, “You’re different. You’re not you anymore. We’ve lost you.” Yes, the Look is completely out of love, but if you’re the Lookee, you can’t help but think, Holy crap—I must look really bad. This must be really bad!
Hell, before this happened to me, I’m quite sure I shot a holster full of Looks, thinking I was helping. Now, I gently suggest to people that they treat their sick loved one like they always have. Just be there for them, and let them know they are still the same person you know and love dearly. Cancer may steal your breast, but it cannot steal you.
Most of the time, I don’t think about my cancer experience. And that’s good. But, because I am now the Girl with Breast Cancer, I’m never really too far from it. And that’s good, too. If you forget about what happens in your life, you often go back to the way you used to live it. Like after someone dies and you say, “I’m going to be different now. I’m going to do more of this and less of that.” But pretty soon, you’re just you again. That will be harder for me to do and it will be harder for me to forget the lessons. I have an army of people reminding me all the time, “This is who you are now! And don’t forget it!”
Don’t get me wrong. I still struggle with some of it. There’s nothing fun about a disfigured—albeit—reconstructed breast. It’s uncomfortable for me to look at it sometimes, so imagine dating. You already have enough regular issues that come along with romance and now another one? God, now I have to explain this thing? Well, I see it this way: only the right guy gets to see my left breast.
15
GET IN THE GAME
One morning, about two months after my surgery, I headed for Central Park for a walk. I stopped at a traffic light right before the park and saw a stream of people flowing along the sidewalk. Thousands of people walking together. I thought, Oh, man, this whole mob of people. I better wait. As I stood on the corner, I began to notice the pink. T-shirts, sneakers, hats. I could tell some of the women were recovering from breast cancer treatment because they were bald. Others were holding photographs of loved ones they’d lost. I hadn’t remembered that this was the day of the 5K Revlon Run/Walk for Women. I watched all the participants go by and I began to clap.
“Clap, clap, clap . . . watch, watch, watch.”
Then I started to cry. Tears began to stream down my face as I clapped. These were my sisters, and I was standing on the sidelines. I stood there like an outsider when I was actually totally connected to them and their—our—cause. They didn’t know.
I decided it was time to get in the game. Time to stop clapping and start changing my attitude about my cancer experience. I wanted so badly to put it behind me that I’d denied the need to keep it in the forefront, too. To support and be supported by others. I watched until the very last person walked past. Instead of entering the park, I turned around and walked back home. I was tired and rejuvenated at the same time. The man on the plane, deciding to share my story on the Today show, my sideline experience with the Revlon Run/Walk. I really did ease into my commitment to embrace breast cancer and the responsibility that comes with survivorhood.
One day, the senior producer of the Today show fourth hour, Amy Rosenblum, asked me, “Why don’t we make a ring for you that says FORWARD?” She knew it was the word I’d kept writing in my journal. There were dozens of bracelets out: LIVE STRONG, SUPPORT OUR TROOPS, ORGAN DONATION, ANIMAL RIGHTS. Amy thought a ring would be special. I loved the idea. Dainty and powerful at the same time, my little pink rubber FORWARD ring was like my woobie. I wore it for two years straight, every day. It reminded me that I had made it through, and that I had to keep moving forward. We got a lot of requests from Today show viewers who wanted a ring for themselves or someone they loved. So, we began offering them for sale at the NBC Experience Store and online. Some of the profits go to Susan G. Komen for the Cure, so it makes a lot of sense. I don’t wear my woobie everyday anymore, but I do pop it back on when I need a little comfort.
• • •
Slowly, after my story ran on the Today show, I began to make speeches about breast cancer. One of the first was a March 2008 Health Expo in Davenport, Iowa. It had been one year since my surgery. After that, Sheryl Crow’s manager asked me to speak at an event for Women & Cancer magazine. I was later featured in the Summer 2008 issue. Several months later, I was fly-fishing in rural New York with breast cancer survivors. The next month, I appeared at a health fair in Boston, followed by a speech at the New Orleans Press Club. You get the idea. Now, I give an average of about twelve speeches throughout the year, mostly on weekends. I travel anywhere from the Cayman Islands to the Quad Cities to commencements. I talk for about fifteen minutes and then chat with people afterward for as long as the group wants. I love to share that time with the women and men who attend. I try to give it my all when I’m able to participate in an event, because unfortunately, I do have to say no to some requests.
In June of 2009, I was asked to be the honorary chair of the Komen St. Louis Race for the Cure. I did not expect the turnout or the hoopla that this city generates. Wow! All of downtown was bathed in pink, including the water in the stone fountains. My job was to start the 5K race, and when they hoisted me up in a cherry picker, the view took my breath away. An ocean of people stretched out before me, survivors in pink T-shirts, the remaining participants in white. Over a loudspeaker, they called out for the one-year survivors, then the five-year, then the ten-, even the twenty-. By the time they got to the thirty-year survivors, I just wanted to get down on my knees and sob. It was emotional and beautiful and overwhelming. I tried from my swaying white bucket to make eye contact with individual faces; to call out names I could read on T-shirts. Starting that race was an honor and a thrill. I watched hundreds of people stream by for a while, then I got down from my bucket and joined in the race.
• • •
Pink power
Now you know how I lost a breast. Now I know what I’ve gained—some very important lessons. One is: Life has margins and should be valued, not wasted. Banging around in my head is, Not one more minute. I will not waste one more minute. Another is: Hold on tightly to the things you love. And get rid of the things you don’t.
I’ve also walked away with four words. Four wonderful words. If you survive breast cancer or any other illness or any tragedy, you get the gift of these words: You can’t scare me.
How perfect. How powerful.
And you know what? Those four little words are what landed me the fourth hour of the Today show.
P.S.
Among the many songs that lifted my spirits during this tough year was “Anyway” cowritten and performed by Martina McBride. On the hardest of days, this song inspired me to believe—anyway. You may want to track it down for your next tough day.
PART FOUR
Life Without Cue Cards
16
YOU CAN’T SCARE ME
There are employees who wait to be noticed. Maybe you work with someone who does. Maybe you wait yourself. I used to. I figured if I did my job well at Dateline, my bosses would see
and I would be rewarded. I never asked for a promotion. Maybe I was afraid to ask. Afraid to be rejected. But things changed. After my cancer surgery, the New Me was fearless. I had survived cancer and I was armed with my four wonderful words: You can’t scare me. Suddenly, talking to my bosses about a possible promotion seemed so small, so nothing. I wanted to be considered for the new fourth hour of the Today show. And I was going to say it out loud.
I made an appointment with the CEO of NBC Universal, Jeff Zucker. I told him about the New Me—the four words, the fearless thing. I told him I wanted to host the new hour of the Today show. I told him why I would be good, what I brought to the table. I just needed a shot. Jeff listened and said he would think about it. Next, I headed down to the third floor of 30 Rock and met with Steve Capus, president of the News Division, and gave the same speech again. I was not afraid, not nervous—none of it. I did it! I asked for it.
In the meantime, I continued work at Dateline and also filled in a bit on the nine o’clock hour and at the news desk of Today. At that time, the Today show was doing well but being tweaked by a 5-foot triple shot of espresso named Amy Rosenblum. Her energy is endless and so are her ideas. (Just like her idea for my FORWARD ring!) When Amy talks, you just bump along on the white caps churning atop her stream of consciousness. Amy is the woman people hire when they want to change a room. She tells it like it is and what it’s going to be like from now on. NBC hired her to shake up the comfortably number one Today show and make it even better. As you might imagine, she’s not always the most popular gal in the room. That’s the down side of being exceptionally good at reconstruction.