On a recent episode of the TODAY show, Hoda Kotb, reveals her daughter, Hope’s mysterious health diagnosis. The former NBC host shared that the five-year-old has been diagnosed with Type I diabetes.

In the interview, the 60-year-old mother confirmed that her daughter’s condition unquestionably was a significant factor in her leaving her 26-year stint on NBC.

“As anyone with a child who has Type 1 [knows], especially a little kid, you’re constantly watching, you’re constantly monitoring, you’re constantly checking, which is what I did all the time when I was [at ‘Today.’] You’re distracted,” she said.  Kotb continued in the interview, stating that Hope’s health made her rethink her priorities in life.

“I can be here and sweating what’s happening to Hope in the morning and in the night, or I can be there and feel relief that I can see,” she explained.

The veteran news anchor confirmed that although her daughter is “fine for most of the day…There are just moments where you have to watch her. I was totaling it up — five minutes at breakfast, five minutes at lunch, five minutes at dinner, sometimes overnight. Add that up, that’s a half-hour. So for 23 and a half hours, she’s every other kid. So I try to remember that.”

Kotb told People Magazine that Hope “… was getting shots — four or five a day — every day for a year;” however, “now she’s getting them less frequently.”

“Now she is getting them less frequently because we have some other means to get her what she needs, but there’s a lot to it. Some kids can have sweets, and she can’t. If she’s up in the night, we have to take care of her at night.” Yet, Kotb assured everyone that Hope is “happy, healthy, [and] rambunctious,” learning to not let her diagnosis define her. 

“Diabetes is a part of her but not all of her. I hope it shapes her but never defines her.”

Kotb shares her two daughters: Haley Joy Kotb, 9, and Hope Catherine Kotb, 5, with  ex-fiancé Joel Schiffman.

Photo: Hoda Kotb Instagram