MTV's Cory Wharton Shares His Biggest Wish for Daughter Maya's Health
Cory Wharton is hoping that toughness, uh, runs in the family.
Because after years of watching his 4-year-old daughter Maya literally fight for her life due to complications stemming from her rare congenital heart defect, he knows he can't sprint away from any challenge.
So when The Children's Heart Foundation asked if he'd be willing to take on his most grueling final yet, the Nov. 1 TCS New York City Marathon, "I said yes," The Challenge star detailed in an exclusive interview with E! News. Despite having never run more than an hour without stopping, he's aiming to gut it out for a few more on the 26.2-mile course designed and put on by the New York Road Runners.
"I'm just happy that I get the chance to run and be a part of this and feel the energy of the crowd," he explained, "and for it to be for a good cause just gives me that much more motivation to get it under five."
And should he be tempted to stop while winding through the city's five boroughs, he need only think of his strong AF preschooler.
As the 35-year-old, who's raised upwards of $11,000 to date, put it, "It's just giving me all the motivation that I need."
And, yes, the dad of three (he shares Maya and Mila, 6, with ex Taylor Selfridge, as well as Ryder, 9, with Cheyenne Floyd) anticipates sobbing once he crosses that finish line.
"Of course I'm going to cry then—I'm going to cry for so many reasons," he detailed. "I can't wait to FaceTime the girls after finishing and just, 'Look at Daddy's medal.'"
But before he toes the line, he's hoping to collect something even more valuable.
"She actually has another surgery," he revealed of Maya's Oct. 22 cath procedure, "that we're all praying for that it goes well."
Best-case scenario, noted Wharton, it will be a one-night stay, assuming her stats stay strong.
Cory Wharton/Instagram
Though, as he and Selfridge are painfully aware, life with tricuspid atresia can be unpredictable.
With Maya's previous open-heart procedures, "it's planned," he noted. "You go in, you know the date, you know the time."
And though enduring the recovery afterward has required quite a bit of heart, it was nothing compared to the call he received while filming the current season of The Challenge.
As Maya was airlifted to a Texas hospital, Wharton caught the first flight out of Thailand. "The moment I saw my daughter for the first time in six weeks, she was on a ventilator," he recounted. "So it was just surreal. From going to shooting a reality TV show in Thailand, thinking everything's OK at home, to going straight into a children's hospital ICU unit for three weeks and sitting down with doctors, and them basically saying that they didn't really know what was going on."
Seeing the professionals flummoxed was admittedly terrifying. "When you see the confusion within the doctors, you get a little bit more worried," said Wharton. Though eventually they discovered "she basically grew these casts in her lungs that closed her left lung. That was the scariest time of my life."
But these days they're all breathing a bit easier.
"We opened that lung back up, she's on her meds," Wharton detailed. "And we'll continue to fight."
At the moment, though, Maya's life is more treats than tricks.
Though, "she's excited for me to run—she gets excited when I go in the back and I'm working out," acknowledged Wharton, "I don't know if she fully understands. She's just worried about what candy she's gonna get trick-or-treating."
Though, of course, he's eyeing sometimes a bit sweeter than any Halloween candy.
"My biggest hope for Maya moving forward is that hopefully her heart is fine until she's an adult," he explained. While she'll need to undergo yet another surgery in her 30s, he noted, "Let's just pray there's no more scares."
Because, if he's being honest, the trauma from Maya's last hospitalization still lingers.
Cory Wharton/Instagram
"I cry sometimes from the PTSD," Wharton admitted. Meaning he's certain he'll tear up as his little girl is taken into her cath procedure: "Seeing her go back, getting wheeled into the surgery room, and you have to be there with her, you want to be there, and you just kind of see her light turn off when they start giving her the anesthesia."
And yet he'll continue to swallow even the toughest medicine.
"It's scary as a parent," Wharton acknowledged. "But you always tell yourself, you’re not the one that it's happening to. So I need to be strong for Maya. I need to be strong for Taylor and for everybody."
Then, he needs to be strong for himself.
Carrying Maya and his inspiration to raise funds and awareness for the Children's Heart Foundation through every step, said Wharton, he's psyched "to feel the energy, to feel the emotion on race day."
And afterward, he gets to join this group of celebs who call themselves marathoners.
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Harry Styles
The singer was heading in one direction—towards the finish line—at both the 2025 Tokyo Marathon and Berlin Marathon.
Instagram / Tayshia Adams
Tayshia Adams
"NYC Marathon, round 2!!" the former Bachelorette wrote on Instagram ahead of the 2024 race after having run it three years prior with her former fiancé Zac Clark. "Bib #38793 in hand and ready for the big day! Can’t wait to see you all cheering out there — I’ll need every bit of that energy!"
Instagram / Claire Holt
Claire Holt
After finishing the 2024 Chicago Marathon, The Originals star reflected on her journey.
"I think one of the most important traits in life is humility, but I’m going to let myself feel proud," she wrote on Instagram. "I woke up at 4am all summer to train for this race. It was really f*cking hard and I asked a lot of my family during those 4 months."
"I doubted myself more often than not, and I was sick to my stomach at the thought of letting anyone down," Holt added. "But today I ran a personal best by 19 minutes (3:44:14), 11 months after having my 3rd kid. I did it because of the unbelievable generosity of friends, family and kind-hearted strangers. I did it because you believed in me, and the cause. Together we raised over $100,000 to help Boston Children’s Hospital tackle the mental health crisis. I am so beyond grateful to you all. Thank you, from the bottom of my heart."
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Colin Farrell
The Banshees of Inisherin star ran the 2024 Irish Life Dublin Marathon.
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Amy Robach & T. J. Holmes
The Amy & T.J. podcast hosts flashed their medals after finishing the 2023 New York City Marathon.
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Cynthia Erivo
"So I did a thing….26.2miles of a thing…. In 3hrs35 minutes," the Wicked star shared on Instagram after finishing the 2022 London Marathon. "I’m proud and I’m exhausted and I’m grateful!! X. @londonmarathon was emotional."
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Ashton Kutcher
Hello Wisconsin, er, New York! The That '70s Show alum celebrated after finishing the NYC Marathon in 2022.
Willie Geist
The Sunday Today host helped raise more than $400,000 for the Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson's Disease while participating in the 2021 New York City Marathon.
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Matt James & Tyler Cameron
The Bachelor Nation stars posed for a pic at the finish line of the New York City Marathon with Matt's now-ex Rachael Kirkconnell in 2021.
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Nev Schulman
We're not catfishing you. The Catfish host has run several marathons, including the 2019 New York City Marathon.
Noam Galai/NYRR via Getty Images
Andi Dorfman
Though the former Bachelorette told People her goal was simply to finish the hilly 26.2-mile course in New York City ("I don't want to be disappointed," she explained of getting her heart set on a specific time) the reality star walked away from the 2019 event with an impressive sub-four-hour finish time.
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Kevin Hart
A year after he tackled his first marathon in NYC, the comedian participated in the 2018 Chicago Marathon to raise funds to help send kids to college. "The reason behind this run is simply first and foremost personal greatness, personal achievement but also what I can bring awareness to, what I can raise money for," he shared on Instagram, shouting, "Education!"
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Karlie Kloss
For the model, the 2017 New York City Marathon was, "Singlehandedly the hardest thing I've ever done." Still, she crushed the course in four hours, 41 minutes.
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Alicia Keys
"One foot in front of the other was my mantra," Alicia posted about finishing the 2015 marathon in the concrete jungle where dreams are made of. (She notched a time of 5:50:52.) And for the Grammy winner, the race was an energizing challenge. "I'm all about breaking mental boundaries," she wrote in a Refinery29 blog post, "and training for a marathon falls right into the Jedi mind-training I need."
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Natalie Dormer
Though the Game of Thrones star insisted she didn't care much about her time in the 2016 London Marathon—noting raising upwards of $7,000 for The National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children's ChildLine service was more important—she admitted to reporters she was "a tiny bit peeved," about her three-hour, 54-minute finish considering it was 24 seconds slower than her 2014 debut.
Paul Marotta/Getty Images for Dana-Farber Cancer Institute
Uzo Aduba
Running the Boston Marathon in 2015 for the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, the Orange Is the New Black star listened to Sara Bareilles' "Brave" in tribute to a friend she lost to the disease. "That was her motivator getting through every single day of treatment, every single round of chemo, that was what she was listening to constantly," she explained. "And I listen to that when I'm training now, and I can hear her telling me, 'Keep going.'"
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Ryan Reynolds
Seeing his dad battle Parkinson's disease inspired the Deadpool actor to run the New York City Marathon in 2008. Finishing in three hours, 50 minutes, he also raised money to help fight the disease by teaming up with Michael J. Fox's Team Fox.
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Katie Holmes
After finishing the NYC marathon in 2007, the actress turned up (in heels!) alongside then-husband Tom Cruise for his Lions for Lambs premiere.
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Will Ferrell
"Running a marathon is not a question of whether it will be painful, but when it will be painful," the actor said after finishing his third marathon—Boston's 2003 race—in less than four hours. He later noted to Podium Runner that people "are terribly underwhelmed when they recognize me in a race. There's nothing funny going on. It's just a lot of silence and pain."
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Oprah Winfrey
After vowing to take on a marathon before she turned 40, the queen of daytime television ran 26.2 miles in Washington, D.C. in 1994. In the pouring rain. As two National Enquirer reporters tagged along tracking her every move. She finished in an impressive four hours, 29 minutes.
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George W. Bush
Having kept up with the sport long after he ran the Houston course in 1993, Bush accepted few excuses from people who said they simply couldn't squeeze a workout in.
"I believe anyone can make the time [to run]," he told Runner's World during his term. "As a matter of fact, I don't believe it—I know it. If the President of the United States can make the time, anyone can."
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