While recently promoting the new season of Mama June: Family Crisis, Mama June Shannon revealed that her granddaughters, Kaitlyn and Kylee, no longer see each other regularly following the death of their mother, (and June’s eldest daughter) Anna Cardwell, though June insists that her family isn’t to blame.
As fans know, Anna died in December 2023 at the age of 29 following a nearly year-long battle with cancer. She was survived by daughters Kaitlyn, 11, and Kylee, 8. In the wake of Anna’s death, Kylee was sent to live with her father, Michael Cardwell, while June went on to fight Michael for custody of Kaitlyn, whose biological father has never been in her life. When recalling last year’s custody battle for Kaitlyn, June told Us Weekly that while the case was “supposed to be done in a couple of hours,” it went on for days.
“It [dragged] on for no reason; not on our behalf, but on their behalf … ,” she insisted, before going on to claim that her family also isn’t at fault for Kaitlyn and Kylee no longer having contact with one another.
“ … it’s not because of us,” she said. “ … [Anna’s eventual death] was a big conversation [for Anna], even outside of cameras, that was a constant thing that she would just say, ‘Y’all got to get used to it. Michael’s going to take Kylee and y’all are never going to see Kylee again.’ We knew that, so we were kind of prepared for that.”
As The Ashley told you in December, June called out her former son-in-law Michael in an interview with People for not allowing her and her family to see Kylee. June noted at the time that Michael had moved from Georgia to Alabama after marrying wife London Smith in September, which had put even more distance between Kylee and June’s family.
After accusing Michael of selling “the same pipeline dream” to his new wife that he once sold to Anna, June claimed that Anna was worried that Michael would take Kylee away from June & Co. following her death, insisting that it was something Anna “really struggled with.”
Based on her recent comments, June has seemingly began to make peace with the fact that Kylee is no longer a consistent presence in her family’s life; however, Anna’s youngest sister, Alana Thompson– who proclaimed on social media in July that Michael and London were not allowing Kylee to see Kaitlyn– recently told Us Weekly that her niece’s absence is “something [they] have to deal with.”
“There’s just nothing we can do about it, Alana added.
The 19-year-old did, however, reveal that Anna’s death has united her family in other ways, despite the current situation with Kylee.
“I feel like Anna passing has brought us all together as a family more, just because we see that life is not as long as we think,” she said. “Sometimes it can end a lot fast that we were hoping.
“We’re not trying to take a day for granted anymore,” Alana added.
New episodes of ‘Mama June: Family Crisis’ air Fridays on WeTV.
(Photos: WeTV; Instagram)
10 Responses
Poor girls. It’s criminal that Kaitlyn has to live with that pos monster instead of the man she sees as her dad and her sister.
It’s absolutely criminal that two girls that lost their mother now have to live apart from each other just because their grandmother is a greedy POS and their mother was stupid enough not to leave in writing what she wanted to happen with both of her daughters. That was negligence on her part.
He’s the bad guy because he doesn’t want to leave his child unsupervised with a recovered meth addict who stole her children’s money and sold their possessions out from under them to bankroll her addiction?!
And also allowed her boyfriend to SA their mother and then brought that same man around their young aunt after he was released from prison.
June shouldn’t be allowed around any children unsupervised.
Who’s husband doesn’t see his own kids.
1. June had almost no relationship with Kylee or Kaitlyn for most of their lives (especially Kylee) and wasn’t involved with them at all until Anna got sick since Anna was estranged from her for years. She needs to stop acting like she was some super involved grandmother.
2. Michael treated Kaitlyn like his own since she was a baby, even after he and Anna split. He continued to pay for Kaitlyn’s schooling and took her during his time with Kylee. Even Anna said that Michael would always be Kaitlyn’s dad.
3. Last time they talked about this, they were complaining because Michael ws letting Kylee visit, but he refused to leave her alone with them. I wouldn’t leave my kid alone with that trash either.
4. The girls would have been together and living a normal, stable life if June would have let Michael take Kaitlyn. But she needed that SSI and a storyline.
June literally fought Michael for custody when he kept maintaining that he did not want to separate the girls. I usually don’t comment on this trash but June is always a victim, right? She, for some reason, fought to get custody of Kaitlyn and is now sad that the kids don’t see each other. How about this silly idea June- you reach out to Michael and ask to set something up for the girls to regularly see each other? Easy peasy and totally doable!
I know this is useless at this point but WHY did Anna not have this in writing???? It is honestly neglectful if you know you don’t have the other parent able to care for your kids in the event of your passing and you don’t nail down a plan for your kids. It’s inexcusable. Who do you think suffers? Your kids! Did Anna not know she had limited time? Come on.
whatever the case was i hope one day everyone puts their petty differences aside because these two sisters not seeing each other anymore after seeing each other everyday hurts them A LOT more than it hurts everyone else but i would also hope that june would at least take it to court if she truly did care that much
It’s not her fault the sisters aren’t together even though she is the one who fought Michael for custody of Kaitlyn?? Of course it’s her fault.
And are we supposed to pretend like June had some super strong bond with Kylee when Anna didn’t even want anything to do with June before her diagnosis?
Michael is right to keep his kid away from these lunatics.
I have a hard time believing Anna said that since she made it clear she wanted him to take BOTH of her daughters. She really should have gotten that shit in writing before her passing.