Adamari López is stronger, healthier and happier than ever: ‘I’m giving myself the respect that I deserve’

Adamari is the same girl that everyone knows. A normal, sincere person, always moving forward and wanting to continue walking with her head held high.

I think I’ve had ... again a roller coaster of emotions regarding things that have happened lately. I’m content with the decisions I have made, but that does not mean that it does not affect me and hit me emotionally. I think this moment came at a good time. I had begun to appreciate certain things that perhaps I had left a little aside, and that have made all this change occurred. Emotionally, physically and spiritually I feel much stronger, much better and I continue working to be well and to provide a great future for my daughter.

Spectacular! I feel very good. I think that with everything I have been through, I have had a very positive life learning experience. Have I had hard times? Yes. Have I had beautiful moments? As well. I think I’m fine. I’m learning about myself more and more. I know the things I want and the things I don’t want. I really value the people around me, what I learn from them. I’m also thankful for the people who have been in my life and who are gone, so that I can learn from what I had to live. And I’m fine. I am ready to continue learning, knowing and moving on.

17 years ago, when I got cancer. This is when the transformation started. Perhaps at that time I did not know. There was a maturity in Adamari that began at that time and that has influenced the Adamari that we see today. At that moment there was a physical change in which I was thinner and what people knew about me, from my career, helped me open up more opportunities for me to be stronger, to grow, to know myself more. And from there, a number of things touched me. This has made me mature and become the woman I’m today.

Two and a half years ago, almost three years ago, I got this other disease -influenza-, in which I was put into a very delicate health situation. It took a lot of strength to get out of it. Then, WW (Weight Watchers) gave me an opportunity to join their ranks and to live this experience of a healthy lifestyle that makes you concentrate not only on the physical part, but also on the emotional and spiritual, learning to love yourself more, to respect yourself more. I think what people are seeing now is a transformation of what WW showed me.

I learned how to value myself more and to put aside what I don’t need, in all aspects, including food, what I should not eat or. It started 17 years ago, and today I was prepared for what I had to experience. Sometimes you don’t understand or don’t recognize it, but I keep working on myself a lot. I keep going to a psychologist, I keep getting to know myself so as not to fall into patterns - nutritional, emotional and interpersonal.

I’m a good human being, and I tend to let a lot of things go by because I accept the people around me as they are no matter how that relationship affects me. I respect the other person with their ideals, and that affection makes me accept things that are not always good for me. Not just in a relationship but in general. And I’m giving myself the respect that I deserve, without offending or hurting the other person. I have to watch over my emotional and physical well-being, because my daughter also depends on that. I do know my process, I do know how it is working for me and I know that I’m doing well. In the end that is what matters.

I go through this process by doing an exercise routine and I really like it! Before I got sick with cancer, I did a lot of exercise, then maybe I was leaving and I thought it was a process in which I could allow myself many things and that it was about me, but I neglected the physical part. And it was hard for me to go back. I had tried, sometimes it was firmer and sometimes I would go off on a tangent again.

I am in a moment in which I feel peaceful. With all the turbulence that may be going on around me, and during times when I may be depressed, I am not without peace. I keep being calm with the decisions I have made during exercise, which has been my way of channeling everything turbulent that can happen. And yes, it is difficult. I get up at 4:30 am. I get to work and my girl goes to school. When I leave work I do some reduction massages, then I go to train, then I try to go home to see if I can eat something. I always try to make meals at home. I run to find Alaïa.

She has a lot of activities. If I can’t, I take turns with Toni so that he can also spend time with her. In that aspect we have a relationship in which we want the best for our daughter and as long as he wants to be present, he will be there. I’m never going to close that door and what I want is a healthy relationship for the emotional benefit of my daughter. That takes precedence over anything. And so it will be. That is not going to take away anything or anyone, and I will not allow it otherwise. As long as he wants to be there.

He is the father of my daughter. That man who will always be connected to our family because nothing can separate us. We have a girl in common and although the emotional part is not attached to him the same way, there will be a part of affection that will always unite us for the well-being of our daughter. So he is going to remain an important person and he is going to remain family.

Yes, chapter closed. There is no way back.

There is no way back for him either.

It is good that it happened at this moment. I don’t know if I would have reacted the same before. I think yes, that self-esteem is an important part, and perhaps, having started a process in which I was focused on my physical and emotional health, and finding myself a little thinner when all these events happened, gave me more strength to keep focusing on me to be okay and in accomplishing things that had cost me time before. And yes, I am stronger now in all aspects to be able to make decisions. Maybe for some reason I didn’t make them before.

I don’t want to say more ... but I think it happened to me when it had to happen to me. Life has teachings. It’s not when you want it, it’s when God says you’re ready for it. It happened to me with Alaïa. It wasn’t when I wanted to and he said, “God, send her to me.” It was when he understood that it was the right thing for me and it happened. And at this moment as well, things could have happened before, and now was when I was ready to make this decision and in the way I made it.

I want to dedicate my time and energy to myself and my daughter. My priority at this time is the two of us, to continue creating trust, that bonding between mother and daughter, that she feels that I am here, that she can trust me, that I will always speak the truth to her. Possibly, but it’s not what I’m thinking about. That’s not my focus. There is still more I want to achieve.

Physically, I want to continue to focus on exercising, eating well, continuing the pattern that I have created so far, and on creating that beautiful relationship between us that we have had in these six years. I want to continue being the foundation so that when she is a teenager or adult, she knows that mom will always be here for her and that she will keep and treasure memories that we have created over the years.

(Laughter) I am now focused on myself. I am not focused on anything else.

Yes! We have been there for her. I hope I have not been wrong and I believe that we are doing things the way they have to be done. He has always had the doors of the house open, and only he can decide what relationship he wants to have with our daughter. From my perspective, he will always be her father, be well received, and she will be there whenever he wants.

She will see us spending Christmas together, farewells to the year, activities at her school. We are going to go out to eat and celebrate - or to go out to eat and not celebrate anything, just be as family. We‘re not going to stop being there for her, and I’m pretty sure he wants to be with his daughter. I will always open the doors of the house for him.

Hopefully not! He has his responsibilities as a dad, as long as he wants to assume them in all aspects, if that continues, I will continue to have open doors.

The same thing that I mentioned before, I think that I am a good person. Putting a stop ... I can tell you in relation to my sister, and I mentioned it to you last time. I don‘t know how to say no even when I feel like they are trespassing in my space. Sometimes I am very permissive, I try to please others more than myself. It may be that, to say one thing, I don’t like this (the dress), but they put it on me. I‘m going to keep quiet and put it on. I have a hard time contradicting someone. I think I can offend or hurt them and that is not my intention. I’d rather eat it with bread and hurt myself.

And it is something that I have to work on, in that allowing many things, things are accepted that are not correct, not only from your partner, but from people who are around you, and that costs me a lot of work. It‘s something I have to keep working on, because I can make the mistake again by having another partner, or by continuing to create friendships. Maybe that’s my usual weak point. All my close friends could tell you, it is very difficult for me to set limits. I accept, even if I don‘t agree, and that brings more problems and leads to other things that end in what may have happened.

We are now separated. I think it has something to do with it ... or a lot.

I think that emotionally today we see many people affected for many reasons. Mental health is being affected today and we see it in both children and adults. The pandemic has also affected us greatly. I do not want my daughter to grow up in the midst of this pandemic, separation, life change ... with some gaps or voids that are going to be reflected later.

My biggest fear is not being able to have emotional stability for my daughter that makes her feel safe from the family nucleus she has regardless of whether mom and dad are together or not. My priority and my main concern is her. That she is emotionally well and that she has us both as parents who can understand each other, who can talk, and as parents to whom one or the other can turn, whenever she needs it.

I believe that there is always a space to be a better version of yourself. And life surprises you with things that you don‘t expect, things that make you keep learning and that force you to make another version of yourself. I have had to reinvent myself many times, and I have had to be a better version of the previous one. Sometimes I have succeeded, sometimes I have stayed in the same place, but always walking towards learning from what I have had to live. I’m still young. I‘m 50 years old. I hope I have many better versions of myself. May life treat me a little better!

I have always wanted to have a stable family, where we can talk, where we can share, travel, create memories. I think that is where I have stumbled the most, where I have had the most falls. In terms of health, I have also had a difficult time, but I have been able to move forward in that regard. But in the other one I go back and stumble a little more.

Yes! Yes! Undoubtedly. Maybe I‘m idealizing that Cinderella fairy tale, and I just have to be a modern woman. Maybe that is what touches me, that realization where there may be someone, but it is not that traditional fairy tale that I imagined as a child.

No, because there has been an apprenticeship. A few days ago Cristián de la Fuente said that life could not be flat, but rather like an electrocardiogram when the heart is beating. You have highs and lows. Well, how cool! Because that means there is life. If it is all flat and nothing happens, it is all very boring, you did not learn anything, you did not experience anything, you did not do anything interesting. Well luckily I‘ve had a lot of heartbeats and that keeps me alive.

Notice that there are things! (Laughter) I’m always thinking that the career in which we develop is unstable, I would like to create a brand of something that can be parallel to my work. I have always come up with something that has to do with fashion, which I really like, or things around the home that I like the decorating part. But I would like it to be with my daughter, it is not something I want to do just for myself, but something I would like to create for both of us.

These days, I have done something that I still don‘t know how it will work out for me, and that I am going to try it first at Alaïa’s school, something that I had created. It has to do with her (laughs). It‘s silly! We are going to put out a line of mom and daughter aprons and some kitchen towels. I’m going to take it out to a school bazaar. She put her letters, it‘s her handwriting and colors. We made a concept where nature also has a lot to do with it because everything is used with natural materials. There is nothing harmful to the environment. The colors and the temptations that we are going to use are taken from the skin of the avocado, from the bark of the tree ... the fabrics are natural. And I want to create something like that, although now it is only aimed at school sales. But I don’t know if something else will come out later that is accessible to the public.