The 'Today' Show Moms Open Up About 'Terrible Mom Guilt': 'It Is So Real'

"I feel sick inside when I'm not with them — I really do feel almost physically ill," Savannah Guthrie tells PEOPLE

The Today show mommies are getting real.

In honor of Mother’s Day, the NBC morning show’s unofficial “moms club” — Kathie Lee Gifford, Hoda Kotb, Savannah Guthrie, Jenna Bush Hager, Dylan Dreyer and Sheinelle Jones — got together for the latest edition of PEOPLE’s Mom Talk video series, now live on PEOPLE/Entertainment Weekly Network,to chat kids, careers and everything in between.

One thing that all six women agree upon when it comes to balancing work and motherhood? That it’s extremely difficult — and they’re all grateful for the village it takes to help raise their kids while they’re on the job.

“I have terrible mom guilt,” admits Guthrie, 45, who is mom to daughter Vale, 2, and son Charles Max, 5 months. “It is so real. I’m hardly ever away from my kids. I mean, hardly ever. I feel sick inside when I’m not with them — I really do feel almost physically ill.”

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“Is it because you miss them so much? Or you feel like you’re letting them down somehow?” asks Gifford, 63, who is mom to son Cody, 27, and daughter Cassidy, 23.

“All of the above,” says Guthrie. “I miss them, I feel I’m letting them down. Even if I’m with them all day, all weekend long, and I want to go take a bath or something — I feel bad if they’re in the other side of the apartment.”

“I’m telling you, I have it bad,” she adds. “Mom guilt is real.”

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Jones, who is mom to twins Clara and Uche, 4, and son Kayin, 7, says seeing that other moms are going through the same thing is reassuring.

“It makes me feel better when I come to work, because a lot of us have that mom guilt,” says Jones, 39. “We’re all doing it, we’re all juggling. Right now they’re being enriched somewhere by somebody.”

Bush Hager, 35, mom to daughters Mila, 4, and Poppy, 20 months, says she can completely relate — in fact, she recently missed her elder daughter’s art show because of work commitments.

“My flight was delayed,” she explains. “Mila said, ‘But Mommy, you weren’t there.’ … Mila went by herself without a parent, and that was the worst, really the worst I’ve ever felt — when she went, ‘Where were you?’ ”

RELATED VIDEO: Savannah Guthrie Shares Her Best Piece of Advice for New Moms

The one new mom who doesn’t let the guilt get to her? Kotb, 52, who recently surprised the world by adopting daughter Haley Joy, 12 weeks.

“I go to work and I sort of feel like I miss Haley, but I don’t ache,” she says. “I remember my mom going to work and saying, ‘I love you and I’m going to work, and when I come home I’m going to love you here.’ ”

“[My parents] missed things, but it didn’t scar me — I knew they loved me,” she adds. “I also knew they loved what they did. We are all workers in a way — we love what we do.”

For more on the Today show moms, pick up this week’s issue of PEOPLE, on newsstands Friday.

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