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Every morning on the Today show, Savannah Guthrie greets viewers with a smile and an upbeat attitude to help them start their day.
But off camera, the beloved journalist and TV personality has dealt with more than her share of personal anguish.
During a recent appearance on Monica Lewinksy’s “Reclaiming” podcast, Guthrie opened up about a particularly painful chapter from her past.
Savannah Guthrie says divorce was ‘horrible,’ required years of recovery
In 2009, Guthrie ended her three-year marriage to Mark Orchard. She rarely speaks about the ordeal publicly, and today, she revealed why that is.
“It was horrible and sad and it broke my heart and it took me years to recover,” Guthrie said when asked why she’s usually tight-lipped on the topic of her divorce.
“And I’m not blaming anyone, but I don’t really want to get into it, you know.”
Guthrie scarcely made mention of her divorce in the religious memoir she published last year.
“It’s the one thing I didn’t want to talk about,” she said of that decision, adding that while she wanted her audience to know she “experienced adversity,” she didn’t want to tell them “the depths of that.”
“Some of it was just too personal and too embarrassing. Which I basically said,” she continued.
Savannah’s happily ever after
These days, Guthrie is happily married to Michael Feldman, her husband of 11 years.
“I met him very soon after getting separated and divorced so I was like, ‘Here’s what’s never going to happen.’ So it took a long long time, but we talked about it because of our differing faiths and because my faith is so important to me,” she explained.
“We dated for five and a half years, wait for it because a lot of reasons, and we both had commitment issues for our own reasons,” Guthrie recalled.
“All I know is that I’m trying to have integrity in my faith with my children and in my family, and Mike is there with me allowing me to do that.”
In February, Guthrie opened up about meeting Feldman and having children later in life.
“When I was 36, I got divorced. I wasn’t married long. That was a huge disappointment. I was pretty sure that I had lost my opportunity and more or less ruined my life,” she told Us Weekly.
“All I ever really wanted was to fall in love, be a mom and have a family. I don’t know if it’s acceptable to admit these days, but that’s kind of how I was. I wanted to do something important and meaningful, but I really wanted a family,” Guthrie went on.
These days, of course, Savannah is living the life she dreamed of.
She and Feldman are parents to two children, and by all accounts, they’re ecstatic in the life they’ve built together.
Savannah is living proof that happy endings are possible at any time.
