In a deeply personal and unflinching essay published in The New Yorker, Tatiana Schlossberg, the 35-year-old granddaughter of President John F. Kennedy and daughter of former U.S. Ambassador Caroline Kennedy, has courageously shared her battle with terminal acute myeloid leukemia (AML). Titled “A Battle with My Blood,” the piece, released on November 22, 2025, lays bare the raw pain of her diagnosis, relentless treatments, and the shadow it casts over her young family. As news of Tatiana Schlossberg’s terminal cancer diagnosis spreads, it has ignited an outpouring of support for the Kennedy family, already no stranger to tragedy.
Who Is Tatiana Schlossberg? A Kennedy Heir Turned Environmental Advocate
Tatiana Celia Kennedy Schlossberg, born in 1990, grew up in the spotlight of one of America’s most iconic political dynasties. The only child of Caroline Kennedy—JFK’s sole surviving child—and environmental artist Edwin Schlossberg, Tatiana has carved her own path far from the corridors of power. A Yale-educated journalist and author, she specializes in climate change and environmental issues, with notable works including her 2017 book Inconspicuous Consumption: The Environmental Impact You Don’t Know You Have.
Married to urologist George Moran, Tatiana is a devoted mother to her two-year-old son and newborn daughter. Her life, once defined by marathon swims across the Hudson River for leukemia charities and skiing grueling 50-kilometer races, now grapples with the unforgiving reality of AML—a fast-progressing blood cancer that disrupts healthy blood cell production. “This couldn’t be happening to me, to my family,” she writes in the essay, capturing the initial shock that echoes through generations of Kennedy grief.
The Shocking Onset: From Joyous Birth to Devastating Diagnosis
Tatiana’s ordeal began on a note of profound joy. On May 25, 2024, she gave birth to her daughter at New York-Presbyterian/Columbia University Irving Medical Center, arriving just minutes before delivery at 7:05 a.m. Her husband George was by her side as their curly-haired baby girl entered the world. But within hours, routine postpartum checks revealed alarming abnormalities: Tatiana’s white blood cell count soared to 131,000 per microliter—over ten times the normal range of 4,000 to 11,000.
What followed was a whirlwind of tests confirming acute myeloid leukemia with a rare genetic mutation known as Inversion 3, typically afflicting older patients rather than a vibrant 34-year-old like Tatiana. The mutation causes immature “blast” cells to overwhelm the bone marrow, starving the body of oxygen-carrying red cells and infection-fighting white ones. Doctors explained it wasn’t curable by standard means; her path would demand aggressive chemotherapy to shrink the blasts, followed by a bone marrow transplant for any hope of remission, and lifelong maintenance drugs to fend off relapse.
Complications mounted quickly. Tatiana suffered a severe postpartum hemorrhage, nearly bleeding out, only to be saved by her quick-thinking obstetrician—the same doctor who had flagged her elevated blood counts during pregnancy. Isolated on a sterile oncology floor, she was separated from her newborn and toddler son, her family hovering anxiously outside. “It’s not leukemia,” she told George in denial, as flashes of her active life—running miles in Central Park, swimming while nine months pregnant—clashed with the sterile hospital reality.
A Grueling Treatment Odyssey: Transplants, Trials, and Relentless Relapses
Tatiana’s five-week stint at Columbia-Presbyterian marked the start of a harrowing journey. Chemotherapy ravaged her body, leading to hair loss (she likened her bald self to a “busted-up Voldemort”), mouth sores that made eating agony, and waves of nausea. Yet, she found solace in small mercies: nurses who bent rules for a teakettle, friends sending Spindrift seltzer and watercolor kits, and her son’s daily visits where he’d “drive” her hospital bed like a race car.
Transferred to Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (MSK)—a global leader in transplants—her sister stepped up as a stem cell donor, enduring hours of arm-draining procedures that left her cells smelling like “canned tomato soup.” The transplant brought temporary remission, but Tatiana’s immune system was wiped clean, forcing her to restart childhood vaccines. Relapse struck swiftly, pulling her into a January 2025 CAR-T cell therapy trial. This experimental treatment engineered her sister’s T-cells to hunt leukemia cells, but it triggered cytokine release syndrome—a life-threatening “inflammation storm” causing respiratory failure, liver strain, and a 20-pound weight loss.
A second transplant in early April 2025 from an unrelated donor—a young man from the Pacific Northwest—offered fleeting hope. Tatiana copied Seamus Heaney poems to her notebook for strength: “Believe that a further shore / Is reachable from here. / Believe in miracles / And cures and healing wells.” But the cancer returned, followed by graft-versus-host disease and an Epstein-Barr virus infection ravaging her kidneys. By late September 2025, she was relearning to walk, unable to lift her children, and down another 10 pounds. Her oncologist’s prognosis: perhaps one more year, sustained only by cutting-edge clinical trials.
Throughout, Tatiana praises her medical team—the bow-tied “mad scientist” transplant doctor who quipped, “Vaya con Dios. Go with God,” while handing her holy water—and especially the nurses. “I have never encountered a group of people who are more competent, more full of grace and empathy, more willing to serve others than nurses,” she writes.
The Emotional Toll: Family Heartache and Kennedy Legacy Shadows
Beyond the physical agony lies an emotional maelstrom. Tatiana mourns the “first year” stolen from her daughter—half of it spent in isolation to avoid infections, unable to change diapers or sing lullabies. Her son, now three, mimics her headscarves and whispers, “I hear you, buddy,” but she fears he’ll forget her face. “My kids, whose faces live permanently on the inside of my eyelids, wouldn’t remember me,” she confesses, her words a poignant gut-punch.
George emerges as her rock, juggling residency duties, insurance battles, and childcare while sleeping on hospital floors. Her parents, Caroline and Edwin, shield their pain while raising the grandchildren in their New York apartment. Siblings provide bone marrow and bedside vigils. Yet, the essay weaves in broader Kennedy woes: cousin Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s controversial HHS confirmation amid vaccine skepticism, which Tatiana links to slashed research funding—nearly $500 million from mRNA studies and billions from the NIH—threatening trials like hers and drugs like cytarabine, derived from ocean sponges. Her father’s polio survival, she notes, was a testament to vaccines RFK Jr. now questions.
Tatiana’s reflections extend to mortality’s unknowns: “When you are dying… you start remembering everything. Images come in flashes—people and places and stray conversations—and refuse to stop.” She abandoned her book on ocean conservation, instead reminding her son of her planet-saving journalism. Through humor—joking about Munchausen syndrome—and poetry, she clings to the present, urging readers to cherish the now.
A Call for Compassion Amid the Kennedy Curse
Tatiana Schlossberg’s terminal cancer diagnosis has reignited discussions on the “Kennedy curse”—a string of misfortunes from assassinations to plane crashes and addictions. Yet, her essay transcends pity, highlighting systemic healthcare strains and the miracle of trials that keep her fighting. As she faces an uncertain future, her words resonate: a plea for empathy, funded research, and belief in “healing wells.”
Fans and well-wishers are rallying online, sharing messages of love for this resilient Kennedy voice. Read the full essay in The New Yorker here. In a world quick to forget, Tatiana’s story reminds us: Fight like hell, love fiercely, and never stop believing in miracles.
