Award-winning journalist Isha Sesay has finally addressed the question that has trailed her for years — why she really walked away from CNN in 2018 — revealing that her mother’s catastrophic stroke was the driving force behind the decision.
Speaking with CNN’s Larry Madowo on African Voices, Sesay said her mother, renowned Sierra Leonean academic Dr. Kadi Sesay, suffered a devastating stroke on December 1, 2016, that left her in a semi-conscious state for years afterward. The moment forced Sesay to confront difficult questions about priorities and mortality.
“Mortality and the finality of life smacks you in the face, and you think, what is it all for?” she said of the experience.
Sesay explained that the timing of internal decisions at CNN simply didn’t leave room for the caregiving role she needed to take on.
“People always ask me, ‘Why did you leave CNN?'” she said. “I left because my mom had a stroke, and I was in a position where, effectively, business decisions were being made that did not align with my responsibilities to care for her.” She was careful to frame the exit as amicable rather than acrimonious, saying she chose to walk away with “no hard feelings” and “tremendous love and respect” for the network’s decision-makers at the time.
A Long, Difficult Goodbye
Sesay’s mother remained in that semi-conscious state for nearly a decade before passing away in June 2025 — meaning Sesay spent years grieving a loss that had, in some ways, already begun.
“In some ways, she was not present. Not gone, but not present,” Sesay reflected. “Then she passed on, and now she’s not physically here. It’s a very strange experience because it’s been grieving for nine years.”
Sesay, who spent 13 years at CNN International after joining in 2005, became one of the network’s most recognizable faces, anchoring CNN Newsroom Live from Los Angeles and contributing to Anderson Cooper 360°. Since stepping away from the network in August 2018, she has built a new chapter centered on humanitarian work, authorship, and advocacy — including writing the book “Beneath the Tamarind Tree” about the Chibok schoolgirls’ abduction, and running her nonprofit W.E. Can Lead, which supports African girls’ education.
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Her reflections on her mother’s illness emerged as part of a broader, deeply personal interview in which she also opened up about choosing single motherhood through IVF at age 46, following the end of her marriage to fellow CNN journalist Leif Coorlim. The revelations offer fans and longtime followers of her journalism a far more intimate picture of the years behind the headlines.