Olivia Munn Says Not Picking Up Son After Mastectomy Was Painful (Exclusive) [Video]

Olivia Munn has cherished moments of sweetness with her young son during a year filled with medical challenges.

In this week’s cover story, the actress, 43, gives PEOPLE a glimpse into her breast cancer journey, which has included four surgeries, a double mastectomy, and medically induced menopause. While it’s been a difficult 12 months, Munn has been able to get through it by leaning on her “strong little family” of three.

But when she returned home three days after her double mastectomy, the star, who is mom to son Malcolm, 2, with partner John Mulaney, 41, was devastated to have to tell her baby (then 1), that she couldn’t pick him up.

“When I woke up, it was really painful and I was really out of it, and I had actually lost a lot of blood and my surgery went from what was supposed to be an 8-hour surgery to a 10-hour surgery because of …