Interview with Ana Cardona, survivor of advanced triple negative breast cancer and author of ‘My only yes, learnings from a cancer’
The psychologist recounts her experience with the disease, hoping to help anyone whose life is difficult
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My only yes (Desclée de Brouwer, 2021) is not a book only for people with cancer, even if its author is a survivor of advanced breast cancer. Ana Cardona, psychologist and psychotherapist, wrote My only yes as a journal for the 10 months that her journey to healing lasted, with a greater purpose: that her experience could help anyone who has to face some adverse event or difficulty in their life, be it an illness, a duel, a break … “To you, who are in your fight, whatever it may be,” reads the dedication.
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My only yes it is a pure and unlabeled book about the suffering that comes standard with life, and about the capacity that we all have –also standard- to sustain that suffering, even though sometimes we don’t know it. My only yes is a book that reminds us on every page that there is also the possibility of marveling at the little things in life; those things that inertia make us take for granted. Ana Cardona talks about Positive Psychology without mentioning Martin Seligman, talk about mindfulness -so fashionable now- not once mentioning that word. Hence that purity; life itself concentrated in 32 chapters; the human being with its lights and shadows …
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Question: In the end, it will be true that having this attitude of the eternal apprentice in the face of life’s adversities helps. No matter how bad things come to us, we will always have the chance to learn something. That is a bit your attitude towards cancer and the idea that you convey in the book …
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Answer: Yes, the question of what do I learn from all this? When I was having a bad time, he would tell me What do I learn from all this? (…) For that reason, many times I sit down to write without knowing what I am going to write… there are times that it shows a lot in the book, because I go around many, many times until suddenly I fall into what I learn. But I would sit down to write with the true intention of “I have to get something out of this.”
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When I was sick, the nonsense stopped bothering me, because for me it was much more important to live (Ana Cardona, psychologist and writer)
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P: If there is a certainty that we all have when we are born, it is that we are going to die some day, however, it is curious because we generally live with our backs to that reality. If we were more aware that we have an expiration date, do you think we would enjoy life more? Or would we suffer more?
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R: Of course, it is one thing to know it and another is to really feel it … And it is curious, because now I notice that when I was ill I was much more aware of everything, it is as if your mind opened. However, Now, it’s true that I complain about nonsense again, and it really bothers me that nonsense. Really, when I was sick, nonsense stopped bothering me, because for me it was much more important to live. I really think that knowing it is not the same as feeling it … feeling that maybe I have four months to live. And it is true that then I thought: “Am I going to complain about this nonsense? Well, I’m going to try to be super happy right now and in the moments when I can be.”
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Q: What was your first learning when you were diagnosed with cancer?
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R: It seemed amazing to me that all the things I complained about, suddenly I wanted to live. For me it was that … I complained about maybe having only a week of vacation there and then having to go to town … I complained about my apartment that is small, I complained about many things about my family, that if my Father tells me this or that (…) and, suddenly, it was to sit down and say, but my little apartment is really cool! That happens when you realize that you can lose something and, in my case, it was losing everything! and he said to me: “How come I haven’t been able to enjoy these things?” I thought that, in reality, we all live complaining – that it is normal to complain about not being comfortable with my boss, for example – but we don’t realize how happy we really are, right? and when you say to yourself: “it’s over.” That was the moment, that’s when I said: “I have to tell people.”
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P: The idea was also to awaken consciences … because it is true that we live for a long time with the automatic pilot on, without realizing anything …
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R: We live with automatic pilot all the time, we run everywhere without realizing the present, what we are doing. Many times they ask me how can you tell people to notice? Well, nothing, simply that when you are walking down the street, that you look at the street, on the sidewalks, that is why it is mindfulness! because maybe the street is super pretty, or maybe not, or there is a super cool tree, or maybe not. Or maybe it’s a great day. It is realizing the present moment. In the book I say: where are you reading the book right now? Stand up, because maybe this moment when you are reading the book is a good time. It’s simple, but it’s a good time – treasure the good times.
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We live in a society that tells us; If you do things well, you will have good consequences, and it is not true! (Ana Cardona, psychologist and writer)
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A: That is why your book is full of questions that you throw at the reader. Is it an invitation to get out of autopilot mode?
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A: What I’m doing is throwing questions at the reader, because I wanted them to have that self-help part. The book began when I realized it, when I was superconscious of the things that I had that I had not been able to appreciate until I said: “I may die anyway.” And when I realized that the fear of death is very different from the fear of the consequences of being alive. That’s when I said to myself: “I have to tell people that whatever you’re afraid of, ask yourself if it’s something you can overcome.”
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Q: We talk a lot about the fear of death, but what scares us the most, sometimes, is life itself …
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R: Yes, many times we lose ourselves in more stupid fears, which are not stupid, be careful, because in life we have to live, work, we want to have a partner, that our children are well. But we live those fears as if the world were going to end and no… the world ends when it ends. And meanwhile, life goes on, that is, let’s not live it like that! Because many times we are paralyzed by the fear of not finding a job, for example. That’s what I wanted to say in the book: don’t be paralyzed by the fear of things in life.
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Q: Do you think it is difficult for us to accept that suffering is part of life?
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R: And that life is like that, yes. For example, it was very strong for me to realize that I had not done anything and that I simply had cancer. In other words, the feeling is that we live in a society that tells us; If you do things well, you will have good consequences, and it is not true! And I tell you that, in a way, it is also okay to give up control; that it seems that we have to have everything under control in today’s society. But the reality is that there is something that we do not control, and once you accept it, you begin to realize that, in everything, there is something that you do not like, there is something that you do not control whatever you do.
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Sadness has the function of charging energy, however, we live wanting to cancel all that (Ana Cardona, psychologist and writer)
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Q: The so-called ‘happiness industry’, the one that seems to push us to always be happy with slogans like ‘if you want, you can’ … Do you think it does more harm than good?
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R: I think we live a bit trying to deny reality. And the reality is that people suffer and that happiness is not being well all the time and that perfection does not exist. And the demand for happiness in society, and that “it’s up to you if you’re not happy, if you want, you can” etc … well … that causes a lot of frustration and also blames a lot that “of course, if I can’t, it’s because of me”. And this also happens in cancer, that “it’s that, maybe, if I don’t have a good attitude, I’m not going to be cured” and no. Medicine here has a lot to say. We take too much responsibility. It is true that we are responsible for our state of mind, but what we cannot do is deny that people have emotions that are not pleasant. But we have them for a reason and they are fine. They are there, and when they come you have to support them, because they are there for something. It would be very rare to go through a process of cancer, a grief, a separation, without feeling sad. Because it is that sadness has the function of charging the energies, however, we live wanting to cancel all that … the phrase is ‘make every Monday a Friday’ … no, look, no. Do not take away from me the ‘Monday to Thursday’ that, even if I have to go to work, what I will have to do is find moments that I like at work … But a Monday is a Monday! and sometime my life will go wrong … for sure! And sometimes I’m going to think that I can’t handle this … sure! But it is that sometimes we live a little in the demand for happiness, in the “if you want, you can.”
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Q: At the end of your book you say that you still do not identify with the term cancer survivor. It’s been more than two years of that. Do you see yourself now as a survivor?
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R: When they say ‘cancer survivor’ and you are in that moment, it is difficult. I tried not to pay attention to anything that could tell me that I was not going to get over it and of course, the word ‘survivor’ itself speaks of you surviving something. Now I clearly see myself as a survivor. Although it seems to me that is to sing victory before time. Actually I have two years to say: now … I am.
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