courtesy: JON KOPALOFF/GETTY IMAGES
TV star Maria Menounos disclosed that she underwent surgery to remove a 3.9-cm tumour after receiving a stage 2 pancreatic cancer diagnosis earlier this year. She is already recuperating and will just require annual scans for the following five years; no further chemotherapy is required 2. This summer, Menounos will also give birth to a child through surrogate.
After receiving diagnoses for Type 1 diabetes in 2022 (which runs in her family) and “excruciating abdominal pain coupled with diarrhea” in November of the previous year, Menounos received her diagnosis. As is sometimes the case with pancreatic cancer, she visited the hospital last autumn with gastrointestinal issues, but a CT scan revealed nothing. ‘Everything’s fine,’ they declared. But I still had pains, Menounos recalled, adding that at one point it felt like “someone was tearing my insides apart.” She benefited from the recommendation of a friend who runs a business that performs full-body MRIs because the scan revealed the lump on her pancreas. It was a malignant neuroendocrine tumor, according to a biopsy.
Menounos underwent surgery to remove the tumor, a fibroid, 17 lymph nodes, a portion of her pancreas, and her spleen in February. It was extremely painful. I was unable to move or stand up, she remarked. Since she and her husband, Keven Undergaro, are currently expecting a daughter, their first child, via surrogate, her recovery is particularly emotional. She exclaimed, “I’m so grateful and so lucky. “God granted me a miracle. “God granted me a miracle. I’m going to appreciate having her in my life so much more than I would have before this journey.”