An hour with Louisa Enriquez is enough to fill the rest of my day with all the sunshine of summer, even though we are meeting over Zoom. Her camera pans around to show me a drum kit in one corner of the room, guitars in another and a pile of her joyful paintings bursting with colour stacked on the floor. Music is her lifeline, her source of this infectious energy, and I am told she’s also the queen of the dance floor on any night.
But if you think it’s because Louisa has been blessed with a carefree life you’d be sorely mistaken for she has had to face challenges that would make the rest of us struggle to smile at all. And yet, here she is, with her warm smile showing me a clip of a music video by her close friend Moira Stafrace in which she has a cameo role.
Louisa is known to her 1,700 Facebook friends for her frank posts about her battle with kidney and bladder cancer and the ongoing care of her 20-year old son Matthew who has already endured 33 operations, the first one at just a few hours old when a priest was called in to give him his last rites.
“It’s like I died 33 times,” she says as she describes the agony she goes through while waiting for her son to come out of the operating theatre from his long and complicated surgeries to correct his malformed spine. He was born with Spina Bifida, a type of open neural tube defect when the spine and spinal cord do not form properly. “I was so focused on doing everything with him that I only break down and get low when he is in theatre being operated. Till he comes out I would be a mess.”
It was on her 44th birthday that Louisa was diagnosed with kidney cancer. She was rushed to hospital in pain and had one of her kidneys removed in March that year. Two months later she was diagnosed with bladder cancer and had to have her bladder and uterus removed at a hospital abroad. It was an ordeal, to say the least, and yet Louisa, with her characteristic positive take on life, described it as “a really good year”.
“Even though I was in agony, it was a year that I will never forget because of all the love and support I received. People were always at my house, I was never alone,” she points out as she describes how her family and friends rallied round to help her.
“Not everyone has a good circle of friends and family there for them so maybe I am lucky. I could have really hit rock bottom otherwise.”
She shared her cancer journey with her many social media followers posting videos from her hospital bed. “I danced on my kitchen table after my first chemo session, then I nearly fell from the counter. It was hilarious,” she chuckles. “My husband thinks I’m mad.”
“I really made sure my spirits were always up. I kept busy,” she continues. “My friends were there for me, even with my son.”
She stressed the importance of seeking help and admitting you need help. “Some people might not admit they need therapy but it’s not bad to go talk to someone. That is important. Go talk to a therapist and open up. I talk a lot and mental health problems start with people who keep everything inside. When you keep everything inside it all accumulates and the brain can’t handle all those emotions.”
So what is the secret to her seemingly endless reserves of positivity? And what advice does she have for anyone who is facing life challenges?
A rocker through and through who has just returned from an AC/DC concert in London, Louisa owes a great deal to music. “Music has helped me a lot. When I am on the dance floor it is like I am in my own world.” But then she continues, “I don’t bother about what people think or say about me. I just live my life. Today is my day because I don’t know what tomorrow brings.”
Diagnosed with ADHD, Louisa has always been full of energy. She brought up her three children, now aged 20, 19 and 18, practically on her own because her husband was working on an oil rig spending several weeks at a time away from home. “I cope with everything. I do everything myself. I multi-task a lot and just keep going. The children help me a lot because they push me without knowing it.”
“My advice to others is to surround themselves with people who are very positive. That helps. Their energy is thrown on to you so it will help you rise a bit over what you are going through. Every situation is different: losing a loved one is different to what I went through. Keep going. Don’t stay dwelling [on the past]. Move forward. There is nothing you can do [about the past]. It is what it is.
“If you are sick and need treatment do not be afraid, just do it because things can progress and get worse if you don’t undergo the treatment. I did whatever it took because I want to be here. You have to keep fighting. The next step can make things better. You have to do whatever needs to be done and cannot remain sad about it. You must bring happiness in your life.”
After everything she has been through with her cancer diagnosis and her son’s ongoing care, Louisa is very much aware of the fact that “life is so short, so precious that I have no time to worry about little things. I just want to have a good time. I want my life to count. I make each day count.”
And how does she see the future? “I don’t even look at the future. I just live for today. Sometimes I do think at night and get really worried but then I shake it off. It’s today that we have. I try not to think too much. I am living with one kidney and usually what happens to one kidney can happen to another kidney so sometimes I get scared but I try not to think about that.”
