NEW YORK – Maria Menounos is back to work, this time to help raise funds for the battle against brain cancer. The 39-year-old TV personality recently revealed her own health struggle, undergoing brain surgery in June to remove a cancerous tumor, and her mother Litsa’s continue battle against Stage 4 brain cancer.
Menounos will host the Angel Ball to raise funds for the battle against the terrible disease, as reported in the New York Daily News.
She will speak at Gabrielle’s Angel Foundation for Cancer Research’s Angel Ball to be held on October 23 at New York’s Cipriani Wall Street
Songwriter and philanthropist Denise Rich founded Gabrielle’s Angel Foundation for Cancer after her 27-year-old daughter, Gabrielle Rich Aouad, lost her battle with Hodgkin’s lymphoma in 1996, as noted on the foundation’s website.
So far $30 million has been raised for cancer research by the foundation. Menounos’ participation will undoubtedly help increase that amount.
This year’s Angel Ball will honor producer and humanitarian Nikki Cole and Rally Health CEO Grant Verstandig. The chairwomen for the gala include Lorraine Schwartz, Ofira Sandberg, and Michele Rella.
Maria Menounos plans on sharing her own story this year, and her presence at the gala highlights her courage in dealing with cancer. She is also redefining her personal priorities, posting on Instagram just a few days ago, she said that standing up for people facing the same problem is now “at the top of my list.”
She told NBC that “receiving her own diagnosis felt almost surreal,” since her mother had been diagnosed with a brain tumor and also underwent surgery a few months ago with her condition, as of today, reported as stable.
The popular presenter understood that something was happening with her health in February when she started to experience dizziness and headaches as well as difficulties in speech and reading. She dealt with the diagnosis with great calmness and eventually underwent surgery on her 39th birthday on June 8th.
The tumor removed was the size of a golf ball. Now, Menounos urges everyone to listen to their bodies and get checked out before it is too late. She told People magazine, “We’re caretakers as women and we put ourselves last. I tell people all the time if your car is making a weird noise, you take it to the mechanic. How come when our body is making weird noises, we ignore it? I’m so lucky that I went to the doctor and raised the alarm.”
At the October 23 event, Menounos will appear in front of a large audience to share her personal experience and help raise money for the battle against cancer. “I think that this was a gift because I needed to change my life,” she said recently in an interview with NBC.
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