“Nothing could stop me” (Exclusive)

In an exclusive interview with PEOPLE, the star of “Love Is Blind” speaks publicly about how she dealt with the news

Shaina Hurley was only last month pregnant with her “miracle baby” when she received the news that would turn her life upside down: she had cervical cancer.

In an exclusive interview with PEOPLE, the Love makes you blind The star is speaking publicly about how she dealt with the news – and how trusting her instincts helped her get through a turbulent pregnancy that ultimately led to the birth of her healthy baby boy.

Hurley has been cancer-free since June 2024 and tells PEOPLE, “I'm on the other side now.”

On the other side and finally ready to tell her story.

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Related: Love makes you blind's Shaina Hurley is happy about her first baby with husband Christos Lardakis: “Our miracle” (Exclusive)

Hurley welcomed her first baby, a son named Yiorgos David, with husband Christos Lardakis on Monday, February 1, she previously shared exclusively with PEOPLE.

But the road to her delivery was long and marked by joy, fear and uncertainty after a routine Pap smear in the eighth week.

“I had no symptoms,” Hurley explains in a recent interview. “But later the doctor called me and said the Pap smear results were abnormal and they would have to schedule me for a colposcopy.”

About a month later, she underwent the procedure, and a doctor immediately told her, “It doesn’t look good.”

After the test was sent to Northwestern, doctors were able to confirm a day later that she had stage 2 cervical cancer.

“I felt the fear rising within me, but I knew right away that I couldn't let the enemy take over my mind. I couldn't go down into that dark hole,” Hurley says. “I had to go into survival mode and tell God, 'I trust you.' I just prayed for the best at the end of the day.”

Doctors urged Hurley to undergo a cold knife conization, a procedure that would allow them to determine how far the cancer had spread and remove as much of it as possible.

But the procedure, in which a cone-shaped piece of tissue is removed from the cervix, carries risks.

“The problem is, I was pregnant. [The] The cervix holds the pregnancy. I was only three months pregnant and would have most likely lost the baby,” says Hurley. “At that point, I just couldn't risk it.”

Since Hurley was 22 weeks pregnant, the next alternative was laparoscopic surgery to make sure the cancer had not spread to the lymph nodes.

“It hadn't spread to the lymph nodes, but they still wanted to do chemotherapy,” says Hurley. “I still had no symptoms, so I refused chemotherapy. It was hard on the doctors because I was their patient first and foremost. And I was a difficult patient.”

In the weeks that followed, Hurley says she advocated for both herself and her baby, and refused when doctors suggested she deliver at 32 weeks so they could see if the cancer had changed or spread.

“I felt it was too early,” she says. “I took the risk, postponed the birth to 37.5 weeks and gave birth to a healthy boy.”

And although the delivery went without major complications, her friends and family were worried, she says.

“I don't think my husband and I have ever had more intense conflict in our marriage,” she says. “He wanted the baby, but he also said, 'Shaina, I don't want to lose my wife. I want you to be here to raise the baby.'”

She adds: “My faith and strong will prevailed and I couldn't do it any other way. Before Yiorgos we had a miscarriage and when I finally had a healthy pregnancy nothing could stop me. But there was a dark shadow hanging over it.”

Although doctors performed biopsies during the cesarean section, Hurley was not out of the woods yet. Two weeks after giving birth, she suffered a mild stroke (TIA).

“I was feeding my son and my hands went numb and then it shot down the left side of my body. My face drooped, I couldn't say anything,” she describes.

She recovered from the mild stroke without any major side effects and then four weeks later underwent the cold knife conization that doctors had been urging her to do for months – but to no avail.

“They did the surgery, waited two weeks, and it didn't do anything,” Hurley says. “The cancer was still there.”

Six weeks later, she underwent another cold knife conization, and two weeks later, she received the words she had prayed for: “I have finally been cancer-free since June.”

Over the next few years, she will go to the doctor every three months for check-ups. “We officially have to wait a year after the last surgery, just to make sure my body is OK,” she says, “but we still want more babies.”

She continues, “Right now, I’m focused on being a mom and taking it day by day.”

Part of this everyday life is reconnecting with old colleagues – like Love makes you blind Zanab Jaffrey from Season 3, who recently visited Hurley in Chicago.

“I kind of isolated myself to protect my mental health, but I confided in Zanab and she checked on me,” Hurley says.

Related: 'Love Is Blind' Star Shaina Hurley and Husband Expecting First Baby: 'Our Hearts Are Full' (Exclusive)

Hurley adds that she intentionally avoided speaking publicly about her cancer, choosing instead to stay strong and remain silent.

“My strength came from my relationship with the Lord,” she says. “On this earth we suffer. But it is How we suffer, that is the real test. If it hadn't been for my relationship with God, I don't think I would have had the strength to do it.”

She adds that during and after her pregnancy, she never even uttered the word “cancer” – until the cancer was gone from her body.

But now she sees this path as a journey that has given her strength. So much so that she will give a public speech about her cancer at a gala that she is co-hosting with her husband on November 2nd.

“I'm going to give a speech where I give my testimony and we're going to raise money for more cancer research. This is definitely a new journey – a different life,” she says. “And it's made me stronger.”

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