WASHINGTON — Tatiana Schlossberg, known as the daughter of Caroline Kennedy and granddaughter of former President John F. Kennedy, has publicly disclosed that she is battling terminal cancer.

At 35, Schlossberg recounted in her essay that she was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia shortly after delivering her second child in May 2024. The alarming diagnosis arose from routine postpartum blood tests, where her white blood cell count was found to be more than ten times the normal amount.

“Typically, a healthy white blood cell count ranges from four to eleven thousand cells per microliter,” Schlossberg explained. “Mine was an astonishing one hundred and thirty-one thousand.” Further examinations led to the discovery of a rare genetic mutation known as Inversion 3.

“I didn’t feel ill,” she reflected, expressing her initial shock at the diagnosis. “In fact, I considered myself one of the healthiest individuals I knew.”

Schlossberg and her husband, George Moran, have a 3-year-old son and a 1-year-old daughter. She spent five weeks in the hospital after giving birth and later underwent a bone marrow transplant at Memorial Sloan Kettering. She continued chemotherapy at home before joining a clinical trial for CAR-T cell therapy in January.

According to the essay, her doctors have since told her she likely has about a year to live.

Schlossberg wrote about the support from her family throughout her treatment, praising her husband for “talking to all the doctors and insurance people” and sleeping on the floor of the hospital. She said her parents and siblings “have been raising my children and sitting in my various hospital rooms almost every day for the last year and a half.”

Schlossberg, an environmental journalist and author, also reflected on the strain her illness has placed on her family. 

“They have held my hand unflinchingly while I have suffered, trying not to show their pain and sadness in order to protect me from it,” she said. “This has been a great gift, even though I feel their pain every day.”

“Now I have added a new tragedy to her life, to our family’s life, and there’s nothing I can do to stop it,” Schlossberg added.

She said she is focusing on spending time with her children. “Mostly, I try to live and be with them now,” she said. “But being in the present is harder than it sounds, so I let the memories come and go.”