In her new book, “I Want to Matter: Your Life Is Too Short and Too Precious to Waste,” Kathie Lee Gifford opens up about how she dealt with her late husband Frank Gifford’s infidelity and her decision to stay in the marriage.
Gifford, 70, says that after news of Frank’s affair broke, she struggled with the concept of forgiveness. However, she ultimately decided to stay in the marriage for the sake of her children and her own happiness.
“I could have let the seed germinate, but I don’t want to be that person, that bitter, angry, unhappy, miserable human being, ’cause you know what you end up doing? You end up making everybody around you every bit as miserable,” she shares in an interview with ET.
“I have always felt from my earliest youth that I had the choice every day of my life to be a blessing or a burden, and I want to be a blessing.”
Gifford says that she learned the importance of forgiveness in her first marriage, which ended in divorce.
“I’d been married before to a man who betrayed me deeply, and I forgave him right away,” she says. “You don’t hold on, don’t wait to forgive… you’re only hurting yourself.”
“Immediately forgive because love cannot live where hate does.”
Gifford says that she still finds peace in her decision to forgive Frank, even though it was a difficult road at the time.
“People always say to me, ‘Do you have a statement?’ I say, ‘You know what? We are our statement,” she says.
In addition to discussing her marriage, Gifford also opens up about her former co-host Hoda Kotb’s recent push for her to be the first-ever Golden Bachelorette. While Gifford says she had a “great” conversation with the producers, she ultimately decided that it would not be a good fit for her.
“I’m too well known,” she says. “And I’m weirded out by the idea of entertaining bachelors who know me, but that I don’t know back.”
“I don’t believe that in a matter of weeks [I would] fall madly in love with somebody. For me, it would never work that way.”
I Want to Matter: Your Life Is Too Short and Too Precious to Waste hits shelves on April 30.
