Mama June and Lauryn “Pumpkin” Efird are struggling on the upcoming episode of Mama June: Family Crisis. In ET’s exclusive, sneak peek clip, the mother-daughter duo emotionally discuss Anna “Chickadee” Cardwell’s inability to accept her imminent death amid her battle with cancer.
“I think Anna just gets so wound up,” Mama June says. “I tried to ask the doctor her time frame, and then she cut him off. She was like, ‘Oh, I’ve heard one, five and 10 years.’ He looked at her and said, ‘You’re not going to make it 10 years. You’re not going to make it five years.’
“She is not living in reality at all, Mama. She does not realize she’s going to die. crying I think she knows she’s going to die, but…” Pumpkin trails off, with Mama June supplying, “She doesn’t want to face it.”
“But she needs to, Mama, though,” Pumpkin notes.
Mama June goes on to explain that see looked into a life insurance policy for Anna and her children, Kaitlyn and Kylee, but was unable to secure one without documents Anna had yet to provide.
“I’m kind of shocked that Mama’s even looking into life insurance policies for the girls and for Anna, but honestly, I think that’s very important, because the girls are top priority,” Pumpkin tells the cameras. “Anna’s husband Eldridge [Toney] isn’t even the biological father of the two kids. Kylee, her dad is still in the picture, so legally he would get custody of her. But with Kaitlyn, she doesn’t have a dad around or in the picture at all, so it’s like, where is she going to go?”
Back in her conversation with Mama June, Pumpkin says, “The cancer part wouldn’t be so bad if she would just fix the stuff that needs to be fixed, get her affairs in order, and then we’d all be able to just hang out and worry about spending time with her.”
Mama June agrees, telling her daughter, “She’s in the reality that Eldridge, just because they’re married, he’s going to get the rights, but that’s not the case… She says she wants Eldridge to adopt Kaitlyn, but when that time comes and Eldridge says something about it, she kind of hesitates. If you don’t want Eldridge to [do it] and you want me or Pumpkin…”
“No,” Pumpkin insists of taking on her nieces. “This is Anna’s fight that we’re all helping her out with. I can’t sign Kaitlyn over to nobody. You can’t sign Kaitlyn over to nobody. It’s the fight that Anna needs to continue to f**king fight.”
Pumpkin then gets up to leave, encouraging Mama June to try to get through to Anna.
“It’s like talking to a brick wall in there,” Mama June complains, to which Pumpkin is quick to respond, “Well, you wanted the f**king Mama title back, you can have it back.”
Anna was diagnosed with stage 4 cancer in January 2023. After undergoing treatment, Anna died in December. When ET spoke to Mama June months before Anna’s death, the reality star knew her daughter wouldn’t survive.
“For me, it’s an emotional rollercoaster sometimes. Mentally it’s always on my mind. We know it’s terminal,” she said. “She’s stage 4. She’s not gonna go into remission. We’ve all accepted that, so I just tell people one day at a time ’cause you never know.”
Mama June: Family Crisis airs Fridays on WEtv and streams on ALLBLK.
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