Mama June Shannon is still processing the death of her daughter Anna "Chickadee" Cardwell.
"I have my good days, I have my bad days — certain things that I'll do remind me of her," Shannon, 44, told the Daily Mail in an interview with her family. "We do talk about her quite a bit. We all carry her with us."
To that, her daughter Lauryn "Pumpkin" Efird noted that "it sucks."
They will plead, “Our Lord! You made us lifeless twice, and gave us life twice. Now we confess our sins. So is there any way out?”(The Quran - Chapter Ghafir : 11)
"Going on in life and ... her not being here really kind of f---s with you at the end of the day," Efird continued, explaining that the family's focus is "keeping her memory alive for her kids."
"We're always reminding them, 'Your momma loved you. Your momma is always here with you,'" she added.
Cardwell died in December at age 28, less than year after being diagnosed with stage 4 adrenal carcinoma in January 2023. She is survived by her daughters Kaitlyn Elizabeth and Kylee Madison.
Shannon announced the news of her daughter's death on Instagram alongside a family photograph.
"With the breaking heart, we are announcing that @annamarie35 is no longer with us," she began. "She passed away in my home last night peacefully at 11:12 PM. She gave one hell of a fight for 10 months she passed away with her family around her like she won’t and we will will be updating y’all with more information as we get it today."
She concluded, "We love y’all and continued prayers and thoughts for our family doing this difficult time."
Opening up about her final days with Cardwell, Shannon told the Daily Mail that "hearing her scream my name at night, hearing her little oxygen cord going round ... she would not keep her oxygen on for anything.'"
"The day before she passed away Kaitlyn was helping us give [Anna] medicine — and she would only take it for [her daughter] Kaitlyn," she continued. "The final things that we all made sure that we said in the last couple of days ... I can't tell you how many times I said I love you."
Mama June: Family Crisis premieres on Feb. 9 at 9 p.m. ET on WE tv, with episodes available to stream on AMC Networks' ALLBLK on Tuesdays.
The final days leading up to the death of Anna "Chickadee" Cardwell were absolutely heartbreaking for Mama June Shannon and the rest of her family.
In a new interview published Wednesday, January 31, the 44-year-old emotionally reflected on the last moments she shared with her eldest daughter before Anna devastatingly lost her battle with stage 4 adrenal carcinoma in December 2023.
"For me personally, I would say I have my good days, I have my bad days. Certain things that I'll do remind me of her," Mama June — who is married to Justin Stroud — explained of how she’s been coping with the loss of her 29-year-old daughter.
"She passed away in mine and Justin's home. Eldridge and the girls and her were living there for three weeks and one day," she detailed in reference to Anna’s husband, Eldridge Toney, and the late mom-of-two’s children, Kaitlyn, 11, and Kylee, 8.
In the days leading up to her passing, Mama June admitted things took a major turn for the worse, noting she was "hearing her scream my name at night, hearing her little oxygen cord going round. She would not keep her oxygen on for anything."
"The day before she passed away Kaitlyn was helping us give [Anna] medicine — and she would only take it for Kaitlyn," she added.
Mama June said there were some "final things we made sure we said. I can't tell you how many times we said, 'I love you.'"
Anna's sister, Lauryn "Pumpkin" Efird, was also present for her mother’s recent interview, and chimed in to point out her older sibling "fought until the very end."
ou could tell at the end, she was ready. She was done. She had fought as much as she could, so just telling her, 'It's OK, everybody’s here,” the 24-year-old recalled.
Anna later died while her whole family was "all standing around her in the living room."
"It definitely happened very quickly. It went from one to five years to 10 months very quickly," Lauryn expressed.
After her older sister’s heart-wrenching death, Lauryn's main focus remains on "keeping her memory alive for her kids and always reminding them, 'Your mama loves you, and your mama's always here with you.'"
"We do talk abut her quite a bit. We carry her with us," Mama June said in agreement.
"I think Kaitlyn is still in shock. Unlike Kylee, Kaitlyn was there when Anna took her last breath," Mama June noted of her granddaughter.
Though Anna’s death brought loads of sadness to her entire family, Lauryn tries her best to hold onto one of her "fondest memories" with Anna, which was "planning the wedding."
Anna married Eldridge in a private ceremony at some point after her devastating cancer diagnosis. Their nuptials are set to be featured on WE tv’s Mama June: Family Crisis on Friday, February 9.
"We did all of that here… for a couple of hours we got to not think about the cancer," Lauryn added.
Eldridge has a similar favorite memory with his wife, which was "having the opportunity to actually marry her and being in that moment."
