Maria Menounos gives an update on her family life… eight months after being diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and two months after welcoming her first child Athena: ‘Motherhood is going great’

After struggling with infertility for over 10 years, Maria Menounos is finally a mom, welcoming her daughter Athena to Ma, and now offering a life update.

The 45-year-old TV presenter also announced in January that she had been diagnosed with stage 2 pancreatic cancer before welcoming Athena via surrogate in June.

Menounos took to Instagram on Wednesday and shared a photo of her in a gray T-shirt that reads “Mom” in pink Barbie font, holding the child off camera.

‘Hello friends! Motherhood is going great. Athena is an angel. She’s currently sleeping on top of me while we get some morning light,’ Menounos began.

“I’m so in love it’s crazy. Thank you to all of you for the love. Looking back at the past 6 years – it’s been a little crazy,” she admitted, before outlining all the heartbreaking life updates she’s been through over the years.

Update: Menounos took to Instagram on Wednesday and shared a photo of her in a gray T-shirt that reads “Mom” in pink Barbie font, holding the child off camera

“Mom gets a brain tumor, then me, two brain surgeries later, then both my parents are hospitalized with COVID, then I lost my mom, then I was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes, then a neuroendocrine tumor on my pancreas. .. another also crazy things in between,’ she added.

Menounos added that her husband Kevin Undergaro told her, “Maybe I roll too well with the punches and I need to sit back and acknowledge it all more – maybe I’ll dig deeper at some point.”

“Right now, just that list makes me so grateful to be alive and thriving. To be here to enjoy this beautiful little girl,” she continued.

‘Thank you God! Thank you St Nectarios and Panagia. I pray it’s all behind us and only great days lie ahead!’ she concluded.

Menounous and Undergaro had tried in vitro fertilization (IVF) several times in the past, as Menounos told the Daily Mail in May that she was ready to give up.

She said she was “fully prepared” never to give birth to a biological child, adding, “I was on the verge of giving up. I was so tired and so down. It is a financial exhaustion and an emotional exhaustion.’

“If (my team that) hadn’t come together to help me find the surrogate within a day, I don’t know where we would be today.

“Sometimes it’s just not our timing and we can’t control it. I will provide comfort to those who are in a situation where they think they won’t be able to get them,” she added.

Crazy stuff: “Mom gets a brain tumor, then me, two brain surgeries later, then both my parents are hospitalized with COVID, then I lost my mom, then I was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes, then a neuroendocrine tumor on my pancreas… some other crazy stuff in between,” she added

Digging deeper: Menounos added that her husband Kevin Undergaro told her, “I might be rolling too well with the punches and I need to sit back and acknowledge it all more – maybe I’ll dig deeper at some point.

Thanks: ‘Thank you god! Thank you St Nectarios and Panagia. I pray it’s all behind us and only great days lie ahead!’ she concluded

Surrogate: “If (my team) hadn’t come together to help me find the surrogate within a day, I don’t know where we would be today

Obviously adoption is a very different path and there are so many children who need homes… There are all kinds of substitutes that can also fill your heart,” she said.

Opening up about her first month as a mother, the former E! host gushed: “Motherhood is great. It’s such an interesting, joyful, wonderful experience… It’s been the most amazing month of my life. I am ecstatic.

“I feel like it’s Christmas morning every time I see her and wake up with her and feed her and change her and stuff, it’s just incredible.”

“We would have missed the greatest joy of our lives… To anyone who is struggling, I would say hold on and do what it takes.