Hoda Kotb painfully opens up about dealing with the sudden death of her father: 'The dam just exploded'

Hoda Kotb has opened up about the grief she felt in the weeks after losing her father, who died suddenly from a heart attack when the TV host was still in college. Hoda Kotb opened up the aftermath of her father's death during Thursday's episode of Today with Hoda & Jenna Kotb was a junior at Virginia Tech when her dad, Abdel Kader Kotb, died of a heart attack at the age of 51. Hoda previously revealed that she struggled to get back into her studies after her father's sudden death 'And the other thing I learned, and anyone whose lost someone knows this, sometimes people say, "I don't want to invade their privacy, so I'm not gonna go, I'm not gonna call, I'm not gonna reach out,"' Hoda continued. Hoda told her cohost Jenna Bush Hager that she learned you should 'always reach out' to someone who has lost a loved one 'My dad had passed, and I was in a class and didn't care about my class, didn't care about anything,' Hoda explained Hoda's good friend Peggy Fox once walked out of college class with her in order to console her following the death of her dad The mother-of-two revealed how long-time pal Peggy Fox failed a class to be by her side when school became too much for her to handle. 'There was a quiz, and I remember I looked at the teacher, and the teacher said, "you got to take the quiz," and I wasn't feeling it, and I said, "I'm leaving."'