Teddi Mellencamp has shared her brutally honest thoughts about her ongoing battle with cancer, including what she’s told her children.

The former Real Housewives of Beverly Hills star first received her melanoma diagnosis in 2022, which advanced to stage four in February and metastasized to her lungs and brain.

In a new interview with Us Weekly, Mellencamp revealed how she was dealing with her health struggles.

“I’m fighting for my life,” she told the publication. “But also for my family’s life and all the people I love.”

Mellencamp shares three children, daughters Slate, 12, and Dove, five, and son Cruz, 10, with her husband Edwin Arroyave, from whom she separated last year. Throughout her time on Real Housewives, she would always tell her children, “Moms come back,” whenever they were upset about her leaving them for a work event.

“I have not said that line to them since I’ve been back [from the hospital],” she said. “They all know that I’m fighting the hardest I possibly can, but I haven’t said [it] because I don’t want to lie to them. And I don’t know.”

“Everybody wants me to be super positive all the time,” she said.

“One of my coping mechanisms is being sarcastic. I’d rather joke about it and have the best possible outcome than be completely in denial and have my heart broken.”

In terms of helping her children cope, Mellencamp said she’s started having them see a therapist because she didn’t feel “fully equipped” to help out on her own.

“It is helping because they ask me questions that I probably wouldn’t have thought to give them answers to,” she said.

“They realize when I’m in pain and how massive the surgery was. I don’t know that they know the rest. I think they’re a bit scared. I’m going to fight really hard. I can’t imagine my life without them, so I’m going to do everything I possibly can, no matter how mean it makes me. I can’t imagine — does this sound like a narcissist? — I can’t imagine any of them living without me.”

Last month, Mellencamp revealed in an Instagram post that more tumors were found in her body after doctors had previously removed more tumors than they originally expected during a surgery in February.

“Update from my scans today,” Mellencamp captioned an Instagram post with a photo of herself. “I have multiple tumors in my brain that weren’t able to be removed via surgery. I also have two tumors in my lung. These are all metastases of my melanoma.”

However, she said she will thankfully not have to undergo another surgery as doctors are “hopeful that immunotherapy will effectively treat them.”

Immunotherapy is a type of cancer treatment that uses the body’s immune system to fight the cancer.

According to Us Weekly, Mellencamp was supposed to find out on June 1 whether or not she would need another round of immunotherapy or surgery. However, her treatment plan changed after more tumors were discovered on March 25.