Sheinelle Jones reflected on her first few weeks back on TODAY after the death of her husband, Uche Ojeh.
Sheinelle co-hosted TODAY With Jenna & Friends with Jenna Bush Hager on Monday, Sept. 22, and opened up about the highs and lows of returning to work without her husband supporting her.
“It feels like I was never gone, and then it also feels like it was nine months,” Sheinelle said. “I was telling you, I have this inside of me when I’m on. Especially on a show like this, it’s like, ‘OK, do I tell ’em the truth, or do I try to find the light in the truth?’ But I’m like, this hour, we’re just the truth, right?”
Ojeh, Sheinelle’s husband of 17 years, died at age 45 in May after battling glioblastoma, an aggressive form of brain cancer.
This is Sheinelle’s third week back at work, and she said the end of her first week was hard for her.
“We get through the first week of school, first week I’m back at work — Friday, when we got home, it was tough,” the mom of three said. “Because there was nothing to rally ourselves for. It was just like, ‘Oh, this is it — this is life.’ Kind of sucks.
“Saturday morning for me was tough. Saturdays (are) when we look at each other and we’re like, ‘Oh my God, what a week.’ That Saturday, the first Saturday after the week, it was usually like, ‘Oh my God, that interview on Tuesday, you should have said this. Or what about this?'” she continued. “There was no — my coach was gone, right? My life partner. The days after my first week were tough. Because it’s my new normal.”
She added that being back in the studio made her realize she isn’t sure if people are supposed to be doing one thing right after another.
“I found myself constantly taking out my earpiece because everything just felt busy,” she said. “And up until now, I have thrived in the go-go-go-go-go-go-go.”
Sheinelle referenced a skill she learned from Hoda Kotb, in which the former TODAY co-anchor would schedule time on her calendar to do something just for herself, like take a walk in Central Park.
“I remember when Hoda told us that, I was like, ‘Oh yeah, right, OK,'” she said. “And now I’m like, ‘I have to do that too.’ If it’s going to be maybe, I don’t know, every seven weeks I find a two-hour flight somewhere and I just go sit on a beach, or even if it’s to go get my nails done, whatever it is, I have to carve out that calm.”
Jenna then told Sheinelle she’s never met anyone stronger than her, becoming emotional.
Sheinelle said kindness makes her cry, and pointed to a moment when Jenna sent her a song by Blessing Offor called “Brighter Days.”
Sheinelle recited the lyrics as the song played in the studio, including the line, “I swear that love will find you in your pain.” She said she listened to the song “over and over and over” again.
“Because the concept of love finding you in your pain, that’s what this is,” she said, referring to the support she’s received from her friends, family and viewers. “That’s what it is: Love has found me in my pain.”
“Love is finding me in my pain, and that’s what sustains me,” she added.