You know how your mom just knows things? When you have exciting news, when you're having a bad day, when you're desperately trying to keep something from her? She just...knows.
Well, that truly never goes away.
A year after Maria Menounos' mom Litsa Menounos died from brain cancer, she came through a medium loud and clear. "She was like, ‘Maria's not focusing enough on her health,'" the 44-year-old recalled in an exclusive interview with E! News. "I'm like, 'This is all I do. I have a health and wellness podcast! What am I doing wrong?'"
Yeah, a mother's intuition is never wrong.
In January, after months of searching for answers as to why she felt severe leg and abdominal pain, the Heal Squad host was diagnosed with Stage 2 pancreatic cancer. The following month, doctors successfully removed a nearly 4-inch tumor along with part of her pancreas, spleen, a large fibroid and 17 lymph nodes. Today—thanks to early detection and a little help from Mom—Maria doesn't need chemotherapy or radiation session, just routine scans.
Having battled a disease that's rarely caught early, "I feel lucky to be alive," Maria admitted. "My mom sent me a signal from the other side. I know she's actively protecting and taking care of me."
This wasn't the first time Maria has heard doctors say the word tumor, having been treated for a brain tumor in 2017 as her mom was battling glioblastoma, but it was the first time the diagnosis had come with another horrifying term: Cancer.
"I wanted my mom in that moment," she recalled while holding back tears, "and I wished I had her."
The emotions—"I was on my knees"—continued to came in waves. "When I heard a mass on my pancreas, I was like, ‘I'm in a lot of trouble,'" she said. "I remember I was like, ‘I don't understand.'"
Because this was supposed to be her best year yet. After struggling to conceive for a decade, she and husband Keven Undergaro announced Feb. 7 that they are expecting a baby girl via surrogate this summer. But as Maria recalled, all she could think was, "'How could I finally get blessed with a baby and then I'm not going to get to meet her? This doesn't make sense.'"
Yet such is life. When everything is supposed to work out, you're pitched a scary freakin' curveball. But rather than live in fear, she borrowed her mom's patented just-keep-persevering determination.
"I said to myself, ‘You don't know how the story ends,'" the former E! host shared. "So many of us are used to catastrophizing and the things we catastrophize don't even come to fruition. So, I made that shift."
That meant putting an emphasis on celebrating what was to come. Ahead of sharing the baby news, "I said ‘Keven, we need to do this so that we shift the narrative in our home to joy and not ‘Oh my God, I might not meet her.'"
And she's been maintaining that half-glass-full attitude ever since. Though Mother's Day can be a mixed bag for anyone who has experienced the loss of a parent, Maria looks at it as a time to honor the 42 years she did get with her.
"My mom's no. 1 wish was that I keep smiling," she shared. "I don't know if she's forcing it from the other side, but it works. I'm grateful for what I had with her. I know it's going to get super heavy when this baby comes to not have her, but you keep moving forward. That's it. That's all we can do."
Moving forward means taking the toolbox her mother left behind and continuing to fill it up. "My mom was very protective," Maria noted. "She never let us sleep over at anyone's house. She left us with a babysitter maybe a couple of times. I can't say that's going to happen, but I know that I'm going to carry a lot of the protective measures she had around me. She made sure I was safe and I'm going to make sure my daughter is safe."
Her little one will hear about Yiayia—"I just want her to get to know how amazing my mom was"—and experience her presence daily when she sees the photo of Litsa, clad in a chef's hat, hanging in Maria and Keven's kitchen.
"She's so vibrant and smiling and happy," Maria described. "Every morning, I put my hand on her heart and I tell her I love and miss her. I see her pictures throughout the house, and it's always pictures of her healthy. That helps fade the memories of her without her hair and looking ill. That has really helped me."
When she does feel a wave of grief, of fear, of anxiety approaching, Maria remembers the lessons she's learned from the experts on her podcast: Take it a day by day. Heck, even minute by minute.
"I choose wonder over worry," she admitted. "I wonder what it's going to be like when the doctor gives me good news. I wonder what it's going to be like when I get past this, and I heal. Every time I do it, it works."
Because, if nothing else, her mom taught her life was for the living. And now, as she said, "I'm going to live it. If I can, I will."