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Hugo Mercado: So, my name is Hugo Mercado. I am 64 years old. Really, as always...in medical terms, the words they say, you sometimes need help understanding. I asked a friend who works in a hospital

She didn’t want to tell me about the diagnosis either. And, so, then after asking and asking, they told me that I had prostate cancer.

Interviewer: How… How did you take it at the time? Were you alone?

Were you with your wife or a partner with your children?

Hugo Mercado: No…My family is made up of my wife and three children. They are grown, meaning, the youngest is 28 years old.

The doctors did not tell me in precise terms. I didn’t know I had prostate cancer, right? So, I found out during my routine life. I mean…Later, friends of my wife told her it was prostate cancer.

But no... How can I tell you? My wife was probably crying behind my back.

Without letting me know the weight, she was bearing of the…of my illness. I’m someone who has never been sick; I’ve always been extremely healthy, I never had a hangnail or a toothache.

I have always been, how shall I say, strong as an oak. Never have I not been able to do sports, I never got sick from anything, not a cold or anything, because the body creates antibodies that if you go... Once, I also bicycled a lot, understand? We crossed the Andes riding a bike, and that takes preparation, which takes months to train for, an incredible effort.

And yet, no, never did I realize that I was sick or anything …I have never felt sick, never. I mean, my life is today as
it has always been.

No, absolutely, it didn’t change me, not at all. Just saying I have such a thing. For those of us who do, shall we say, competitively do sports. Sports have always been a kind of therapy, a break from everything because... really sometimes you can’t always deal with everyday problems, anyone. We all, indeed, have problems. Sometimes, we take them to bed with us.

When you are active in sports and do high-intensity exercise, then, you get home at night tired and you sleep peacefully.

That’s what resulted in me not taking it in.

No, no, the moment I found out, yes, I made myself available to the doctors because since it was an early diagnosis, then we had time to be able to consider alternatives if things got complicated.

That’s it, yes. I always followed the orders of doctors of professionals.

The sexuality part. When they take out your prostate, It’s not the same normal life that we had before, right, about couple intimacy.

We have worked it out because we are already a certain age, and we already have other activities.

Sexuality is not crucial for couples at our age.

I live day to day, and I have always done what I wanted to.

In short, I stay active. Do you understand me? I can do everything I want. Not…I don’t regret anything about that. For sure.

Look, the day you... stop dreaming, stop feeling the raindrops, stop feeling the wind in the morning, the cool breeze in the sun, and that you enjoy all of that…That is part of life.

And if we didn’t feel the raindrops, if we didn’t feel the wind. If we didn’t enjoy the stages of life...There is no … How shall I say? We always have to dream, keep dreaming, because it is a disease like so many others, and definitely not terminal.

Some more, some less. But in my case, It’s part of life. I’m coping well, because now I just go in for a blood test every six months.

My fear is that if...if the disease progresses... That would be another fear. If the disease should spread. Do you understand me? So it’s a fear that I would not like to have because, yes...you know that it is a disease that progresses and sometimes...does not stop. But now, there are so many technologies and things that surely…we could treat it.

I do not understand the question.

Faith. Believing in something.

Oh yes, yes.

Let’s see, I am someone who believes in God. It’s not that I’m a regular churchgoer, right? But every day of the week, I go to the sanctuary of the Virgin Mary of Challa and I stop at every virgin that I see. I am always meeting goals and challenges. I don’t always walk in the same place, but I go to different places.

So, there is always the strength that  God or the Virgin Mary gives me.

No, normal. I’m not afraid; maybe I’m more afraid now, more ashamed now that I am in front of a camera that…that with the treatments, do you understand me? I’m always asking something new that my body...How shall I say? Bodies sometimes have a flaw.

Maybe how life changes

Maybe when I have to go to the bathroom, right?

And maybe some inner pains that I have, but...They are…

I have always mentioned it to the doctor.

Always do everything that you ask It is always one more piece of wisdom. And then you internalize things, you read and you find out that it works like this.

These are things that you accumulate due to the processes, right?

Definitely, because it is really when you see the doctor, when …You are looking for relief. Do you understand me?

There is that confidence that tells you: "No, look, Hugo, this works like this, this is like this and that". So, you internalize the questions that you ask the doctor.

Be calm. Do you understand me?

So today, right now ... The disease is not like it was before. There is more technology; there are more machines. There are more remedies. Although we live in a country that is still testing because drugs are always being tested for this disease, new things are being done...but be calm. It’s no use obsessing over a problem that doctors have to fix.

So, the groups of friends that you have, that you have at all levels and from all social classes because sports are for...

There is always someone talking about everybody’s case, right? In my case, definitely, then another friend tells me: "I have this or the other." But everything is done very well

It’s okay because... by having a mix of friends … groups of young guys, older men, from different groups and different social classes, everyone gets along well, and it’s a big family. that are involved in sports I’m going to understand what happens in the case of my family.

It seems that this disease is hereditary, because out of the four brothers that I have, all four have been operated on.

Do you understand me? In the end …All good because my brothers have been operated on, and they are also all fine.

In a different way ... No...Not everyone had their prostate removed, but in different ways, it has always affected them.

Yes, yes, we talked about it because it is…we are going to pass this down to our children. Do you understand me? So I always tell them: "Kids, when you get to be 40 or 50, Remember, you have to take care of all these things because it is the inheritance that I am going to leave them".

Yes, for sure, you always leave …things for them to learn... and try…not to let go, always at an early age, when the doctors say that tests begin at the age of 45 or 50.

I think so because I have always been a fighter. I wake up every day thinking of what I have to do and I will keep doing things
as long as I can.

I keep doing things. Businesses. I don’t want to retire. I have jobs; I have jobs. What can I say?

I have a business, I have a company like this, a banquet hall for parties...

Now, tomorrow, we will open the swimming pool season.

I have a food truck and that requires a lot of work, apart from carrying the… the groceries from the house and everything. Do you understand me? I did not slow down or get sick. I continued working as usual. Might have more work now than when I had the job.

For sure.

Here we are; life is very short.

We have to carry on, put in our batteries, fight it every day.

And yes, you have to push forward.