"In some ways it seems like yesterday, and in other ways it seems like 15 (years),” Kathie Lee Gifford told Hoda Kotb while recently talking about the death of her late husband Frank Gifford. "It’s just weird. You have waves."
Although Frank died in 2015, Kathie Lee gushes about how much she loves him to this very day. And looking back at the pair's relationship, it's easy to understand why.
When Frank's path crossed Kathie Lee's
According to The Washington Post, Frank said he met Kathie Lee while on set at Good Morning America. KLG was a full-time host at the time, and Frank would fill in occasionally, though he was mostly known for commentating on ABC's Monday Night Football. Prior to that, he starred as a New York Giants halfback in the NFL.
“I didn’t like getting up in the morning,” he said about hosting GMA. “Couple times I did it on the way home. Seemed to make more sense. I left PJ Clarke’s at one or two in the morning, I had to be in there at five, so why go home?”
Giving her side of the story, Kathie Lee joked on the Today show in 2017 that "it was love at first sight" thanks to Frank's "buns." The two had a brief interaction talking about contact lenses in the hallways of GMA at 4 a.m., and the rest is history. Frank may have been 23 years her senior, but in Kathie Lee's eyes, it didn't really matter at all.
An unexpected proposal
Even though the two definitely had chemistry, Kathie Lee once admitted on Today that at the time Frank proposed, she thought he was actually breaking up with her.
"We were in Atlantic City because I was performing," Kathie Lee spilled to Hoda. "And Frank had not realized, when we first started dating, how much performing I did." And so, when Frank "very seriously" asked if they could talk, she thought he was going to end things. Turns out, she was way wrong.
"He took out this magnificent ring," Kathie Lee recalled. "I'm not going to say what he said, but it was just beautiful."
And so, on a Bridgehampton, New York beach on October 18, 1986, Frank and Kathie Lee tied the knot.
Four years after getting married, the couple welcomed their son, Cody Newton Gifford, into the world in March of 1990. At the time, People reports that Frank was almost 60, and "reluctant to start a new family," especially since he had three children by his first wife, Maxine Ewart.
But all that changed when Cody arrived, and the publication notes that it was his idea to try for a second child. Sadly, Kathie Lee suffered a miscarriage in August of 1992. It was here that she said Frank "held me tighter than he's ever held me before."
While she was devastated, Kathie was able to get pregnant again, and had a daughter, Cassidy Erin Gifford, in August of the following year.
Four years later, the pair's marriage was tested again when their relationship was rocked by infidelity. It all reportedly started when The Globe tabloid published a story in 1997 about Frank's two-day rendezvous at a hotel with a married flight attendant named Suzen Johnson. Frank initially denied it, but after the publication published photos and a video, Frank changed his tune.
“It’s no fun. It’s horrible. It’s a tremendous test of your relationship,” Kathie Lee admitted on Today in 2017 looking back on the alleged affair. “It takes a lifetime to build that kind of friendship and history together and trust, and it takes one stupid decision to destroy ... Sometimes you run out of time to build it up again. I was grateful that we could.”
Coming out on the other side
Through it all, Kathie Lee and Frank enjoyed many happy years together up until his death in 2015. When asked if Kathie Lee was looking to find love again after her Frank, she told Access Live that she was open to it.
“Some men are afraid of living up to the mantle of Frank Gifford, and there’s no reason for that. Frank was just a flawed man like anybody else is. I didn’t know him as an eight-time Hall of Famer. He was my husband and he was my friend for four years before we fell in love," she said.
Although some time has passed, Kathie Lee says she still struggles with loneliness. Even still, she tries her best to focus on the great memories and the 29 years they had together.
"I’ve discovered that if I just keep thinking about what I’ve lost, I don’t pay any attention to what I still have," Kathie Lee explained. "I don’t want to live my life in hopelessness."
