Earlier this month, legendary musician John Mellencamp shared a grim assessment of his daughter’s health.
He spoke about Teddi’s cancer, describing her as “suffering right now.”
Fans were unsure whether this meant that she was reeling after so many surgeries and cancer treatments, or whether her Stage 4 cancer was back in full force.
Now, the Bravolebrity herself is updating her followers on where things stand.
‘She’s got cancer in the brain, and she’s suffering right now’
As we reported, John Mellencamp made the inexplicable decision to sit down to chat unironically with Joe Rogan.
There, he characterized his 44-year-old daughter as “really sick.”
He elaborated: “She’s got cancer in the brain, and she’s suffering right now.”
Last year was full of dramatic ups and downs for Teddi’s cancer journey.
Ultimately, she had shared positive news about her cancer battle. Did that change? Has her cancer returned?
On the Wednesday, January 28 episode of the Two T’s in a Pod podcast that she and Tamra Judge share, Teddi clarified her father’s comments.
“You know, I think when he said the words ‘suffering,'” she explained, “he meant like, how I’m mentally doing versus how I’m physically doing.”
“Instantly people thought, ‘Oh my God, cancer’s back,’” Tamra expressed.
(Yes, that was a reasonable assumption)
“No, there’s still no trace of cancer,” Teddi confirmed. That is not, however, to say that she’s in remission.
‘I don’t feel great’
“But I’m still considered stage four and I’m still in immunotherapy,” Teddi detailed.
“So essentially nothing’s changed other than I still — I don’t feel great,” she admitted.
Teddi, who has undergone 17 surgeries alongside other treatments, added: “I would hope that I would be feeling better by now, but I really don’t.”
She acknowledged: “I also didn’t properly process all of the things that happened when I had surgery.”
Teddi listed: “like from my divorce to all of a sudden being in emergency surgery, to you know, not being able to see my kids when I was recovering.”
“I think all of those things are starting to finally hit me now,” Teddi shared.
She revealed: “I started doing therapy, and so it’s taken its toll on me.”
The Super Bowl (an annual football game sandwiched around a music performance and seasoned with expensive commercials) will fall on February 8 this year.
According to Teddi, that also happens to be her “cancerversary.” That is, the anniversary of her cancer battle.
‘Every day is a new day’
Cancer treatments, which have included brain surgeries, have changed her body and how she feels.
“It’s hard for me to touch and move, and I can see that I’m slower than I was before, and that’s really frustrating to me,” she expressed. “Like I want to be back to the way I used to be.”
Teddi explained: “I was really fighting for my life … now that the storm has calmed a little, now I’m starting to develop fear where I didn’t have fear before. Like I have fear to do a lot of things.”
Obviously, at the forefront of her mind is the fear “that cancer is going to come back.”
Teddi admitted that she doesn’t feel “super self-sufficient” yet is doing many things alone following her divorce.
“I have to process everything I’ve gone through and now it’s really hit me what I’m going through,” she expressed. “Every day is a new day.”