Featured Image Credit: Charles Sykes/Bravo via Getty Images/Instagram/teddimellencamp
Topics: Health, Real Housewives, Celebrity, Real Life
Lucy Devine
Topics: Health, Real Housewives, Celebrity, Real Life
Teddi Mellencamp has given an update on her cancer battle after revealing her dad has started making plans regarding her funeral.
Taking to Instagram back in February, the 43-year-old broke the news that she has been diagnosed with cancer, while opening up on the handful of unnerving symptoms she suffered in the weeks beforehand.
Mellencamp - who had previously battled stage 2 melanoma and was forced to undergo over lifesaving surgeries - wrote at the time: "For the last several weeks I've been dealing with severe and debilitating headaches.
"Yesterday the pain was unbearable and required hospitalisation. After a CT scan and MRI, doctors found multiple tumors on my brain, which they believe have been growing for at least 6 months.
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"Two of the tumors will be surgically removed today - the remaining smaller tumors will be dealt with via radiation at a later date. I am blessed to be surrounded by my children, family, friends, doctors, nurses and surgeons who are doing everything possible to get me back into better health."
Mellencamp has recently shared a new update on her diagnosis, explaining that doctors had told her that her treatment has a 50/50 chance of working.
Speaking to Nightline, she said: “I learned this isn’t the best question to ask if you’re doing immunotherapy, because immunotherapy has only been around 10 years.
“It’s one of my favorite things to ask: ‘How long I got? What are my chances?’ And they oftentimes say 50/50.
"And [the doctor’s] like, ‘No, it’s only because that’s how long immunotherapy has been around so that’s how long the study has worked.’ So that’s when I then try to find the positive."
Mellencamp explained that she's 'really scared' following the diagnosis, explaining: “I really like to have control, and this is completely out of my control. And for the first time, I’m really scared."
The mother-of-three - who shares a son and two daughters with ex-husband Edwin Arroyave - has also opened up on how her family have taken the news.
Opening up on their morbid new conversations during a recent instalment of her Two Ts In A Pod podcast, she recalled a particularly bizarre catch-up with her dad, John Mellencamp.
"Yesterday my dad calls 11 times in a row. Finally, I answer, I'm like, 'I'm in the bath. Let me live a little'," Mellencamp began.
"He goes, 'I just want to make sure you’re going to be in our group family mausoleum.'"
She claims to have then asked him if there's space for her kids - Slate, 12, Cruz, 10, and Dove, five.
"He’s like, ‘Well, there's going to be the top five and then we're gonna have little areas around it, and then that's where everyone's going to get buried'," she continued.
This week, Mellencamp took to social media where she shared two photos - one from four months ago and another taken during treatment.
"What a difference 4 months makes," she wrote.
"Sometimes I am so focused on 'being strong' that I forget I am allowed to be sad, cry it out, and feel very alone. I love my kids, friends, and family so much and am forever grateful to them but dang today is one of those days.
"If you are having a day where you can’t wait for it to be bedtime so you can start over tomorrow leave me a [heart emoji].
"We are not alone."
If you’ve been affected by any of these issues and want to speak to someone in confidence, contact Macmillan’s Cancer Support Line on 0808 808 00 00, 8am–8pm seven days a week.