Maria Menounos on Moving Forward
- Maria Menounos recently lost her mother to a five-year battle with brain cancer, and even had a surgery for a brain tumor of her own thankfully noncancerous during her mother’s cancer battle.
- Despite recent years of hardship, Menounos is looking ahead with positivity hoping for fertility and prosperity, fortune, luck and transformation.
- Coping with the loss of a loved one to cancer is incredibly challenging, but moving forward with the lessons your loved one taught and remembering that you don’t have to forget them to move forward can be a great place to start.
Litsa was diagnosed with glioblastoma, one of the most common and most aggressive brain tumors in 2016 at the age of 61. She passed on May 3 after a five-year battle with the disease.
Read MoreMenounos underwent a 7-hour brain surgery on her 39th birthday in June 2017. She is doing well now, but she is still coping with the recent loss of her mother. In an Instagram post, however, she shared an optimistic outlook with her followers.
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“Tryin to get back to it,” she wrote. “Found this pigeon. Did you know Pigeons are symbolic of fertility and prosperity, fortune, luck, and transformation. …hoping for all of this.”
In the accompanying photo, Menounos stands in front of a beautifully detailed mural of a pigeon seemingly hopeful for a positive path forward. Regardless of her next steps, its wonderful to see her moving forward with optimism.
Losing a Loved One to Cancer
As Menounos can surely attest to, coping after the loss of a loved one to cancer is never going to be an easy journey. But remembering all the wonderful ways your loved one enriched your life and moving on from there can be such a powerful way to move forward.
In a previous interview with SurvivorNet, Caleb Farley talked about his mother’s battle with breast cancer and how he opted out of his position as a cornerback for the Virginia Tech Hokies due to COVID-19 concerns. Having lost his mom to breast cancer in 2018, he knew he wanted to be extra careful during the pandemic.
Farley announced the news of his opt-out in an Instagram video saying, in part, "I cannot afford to lose another parent or loved one… Though the competitor in me badly wants to play this season, I cannot ignore what's going on in my heart, and I must make the decision that brings me the most peace."
Farley trained for the NFL draft instead of playing for Virginia Tech, and his efforts paid off. He was selected by the Tennessee Titans as the number 22 overall pick in the first round of the 2021 NFL draft.
Farley’s mother fought two battles with cancer. He watched as she went through multiple rounds of chemotherapy while still working and taking care of her family. Although his “superhero” mother will not get to see him play in the NFL, Farley will take many lessons he learned from her and apply them to whatever challenges he faces in life moving forward.
"My mother raised me to be very religious, very God-conscious. That's been everything to me, and my life. That's like the building blocks of my, of my life,” Farley told SurvivorNet. “Anything that's happened to me, any adversity, any good times, any bad times, I've always kind of stood on that rock of faith. I can't thank her enough for how she raised me and because it was her who gave me all of that, um, spiritually, she, she just filled my heart with love and joy. I've had a happy life because of her."
Doug Wendt also lost a loved one to cancer. He told SurvivorNet that after losing his wife, Alice, to a two-year battle with ovarian cancer, he'll never really get over losing her, but he does hope to move forward.
"We're never gonna move on, I don't even think I want to move on, but I do want to move forward," Doug said. "That's an important distinction and I encourage anybody who goes through this journey as a caregiver and then has to face loss, to think very carefully about how to move forward."
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