Albert Espinosa praises 'hospital mother' at Andorra disability event

Author Albert Espinosa spoke remotely at the Centre de Congressos in Andorra la Vella on the occasion of the International Day of Persons with Disabilities, recounting his fight against cancer and the pivotal role played by an elderly Andorran woman he calls his “hospital mother.”

Espinosa — who had cancer from age 14 to 24, during which he lost a leg, a lung and part of his liver — said he would have liked to attend in person but was due to undergo surgery the next day; he added the new operation was likely benign. The talk, titled "If you believe in dreams, they will create themselves," was organized by Afers Socials and the FAAD and drew a full auditorium.

He described how the woman, a 90‑year‑old from Andorra la Vella, taught him courage, humour and how to live with loss. She encouraged the young patients to adopt a defiant motto — “No sois cojos, sois cojonudos” — which Espinosa said became a sort of battle cry among them. She reframed his amputations and treatments in positive terms: “You didn’t lose a leg, you gained a lung; you didn’t lose a lung, you learned you can live with half; and when they removed my liver ‘in the shape of a star’, she said I had a ‘sheriff’ inside me.”

Humour, he said, was another lesson she insisted on. He recounted how people stare at his prosthetic leg and how he turns to catch their attention, a memory that draws laughs. She also taught him to ask questions rather than be afraid to face what people avoid — a habit that made him “the most inquisitive kid in the hospital,” he joked, likening himself to El Lleó from his series Polseres Vermelles.

Espinosa noted links between his own life and the TV series that brought many people to know his story: characters such as El Lleó and Jordi — the latter, he observed, is from Andorra, a small nod to his hospital mother. One specific lesson she passed on was to hold a farewell party for the limb the day before amputation. He invited people connected to that part of his life: a goalkeeper he had played with, a girl he had shared secret footsie moments with, and his nurse for the last dance. Thanks to that ritual, he said, he never felt a lingering phantom; he later buried the leg in a cemetery and quipped that he might be one of the few in the room with a foot in a grave.

Finally, Espinosa recalled her advice on coping with grief when fellow patients died: live the lives of those who pass away so they multiply inside yours. He said that is what he did throughout his years in hospital.