Savannah Guthrie recently gave an interview about her mother’s disappearance (Image: savannahguthrie/Instagram)

Savannah Guthrie is said to be “already processing” her mother’s “absence” as the investigation into her disappearance entered its third month over the weekend.

Nancy Guthrie, 84, was last seen on January 31, after having had dinner at her daughter’s and son-in-law’s house. However, when she failed to attend her usual church service, her family was called, and they found her missing.

Savannah, Nancy’s youngest child, recently took part in an interview on NBC’s Today Show, where she spoke about her mother’s disappearance. And it was during that moment that she recalled the moment she found out she’d gone missing. This comes after a mystery man claimed he “saw Nancy 5 days ago.”

Speaking to Hoda Kotb, she said, “We thought that she must have had some kind of medical episode in the night because the back doors were propped open. But her phone was there, and her purse was there, so it just didn’t make any sense. Annie [Savannah’s sister] had already called all of the hospitals. It was just chaos and disbelief.”

However, a mental health professional has delved into Savannah’s interview and pointed out the subtle ways the acclaimed journalist revealed her feelings about the case.

Savannah Guthrie occasionally spoke about her mother in the past tense during her Today Show intervi (Image: NBC)

Speaking exclusively to Daily Express US, Dr. Kelly Gonderman, clinical director and licensed clinical psychologist at We Conquer Together, said that Savannah’s use of the past tense in the interview could show she is “already processing Nancy’s absence.”

During the interview, Savannah slipped into the past tense as she discussed her mother’s chronic pain, saying, “She was in tremendous pain; her back was very bad. On a good day, she could walk down to the mail box, so this wasn’t a wander off.”

Noting her use of language, Dr. Gonderman said, “When someone shifts to past tense while speaking about a person who is still officially missing, it rarely happens consciously — and that’s exactly what makes it significant. Language reflects the internal model we’ve already constructed, even when we haven’t articulated it out loud.”

Continuing, Dr. Gonderman noted that when she watched Savannah describe Nancy, the use of the past tense “suggests her psyche had already begun processing an absence.”

Additionally, the psychologist said that this does not necessarily mean that the 54-year-old “knows something definitively,” but that “sustained uncertainty at that level of fear eventually forces the mind to begin grieving in order to survive it.”

Dr. Gonderman explained that this is a form of “anticipatory grief,” whereby the “nervous system initiates before the person is ready to consciously acknowledge it.”

Concluding, Dr. Gonderman said that the brain does this to protect itself “by beginning to accept what it most fears, even in the absence of confirmation,” which, for Savannah, the use of the past tense, could show viewers “a window into how profound the private experience of this has been.”