Katie Couric says she was “nervous” to tell her daughters she was diagnosed with breast cancer this summer.
“I told them, but I was very reassuring, but I saw it in their faces. You know, it’s just hard to deliver that news no matter how you do it,” the newscaster said as she returned to the show “Today” Monday morning for an interview.
“But I assured them it would be fine.”
Couric’s daughter Carrie, 26, accompanied the journalist, 65, to her lumpectomy in July to remove the cancer and even sang Sarah McLachlan’s “Angel” as her mother was wheeled into the operating room.
‘She’s so funny. … They’ve been incredibly helpful,” Couric said of Carrie and Ellie, 31, who she shared with her late husband, Jay Monahan.
In an Instagram post encouraging her followers to do health surveys, the self-proclaimed “screen queen” said her children serve as her “reasons” for prioritizing her health.
“Share a photo with whoever or whatever inspires you to put your health first, and share it on social media using the hashtag #IScreenYouScreen,” she captioned a photo of Carrie and Ellie hanging out with her in Central Park. “I’ll post you again! Here are two of my reasons… what are yours? #iscreenyouscreen.”
Couric announced on September 28 — just days before the start of Breast Cancer Awareness Month — that she had been diagnosed with stage 1 breast cancer on June 21, which was also her eighth wedding anniversary to her second husband, John Molner.
Referring to how her daughters lost Monahan to colon cancer in 1998, the author “Going There” wrote in an essay: “The idea of having another [parent] was unfathomable.”
Couric shared on “Today” Monday that she “finished radiation last week” and is “feeling fine”.