Ivette Nadal: "My book is not a Me Too"

BarcelonaFor almost five years, the idea of writing a book about anorexia from the more emotional perspective haunted singer and poet Ivette Nadal (Granollers, 1988). Finally, a while ago, she took the bull by the horns and got started. Poetic justice (Pórtico) is the intimate, profound, and powerful testimony of a woman who, as a teenager, was captivated by musicians and poets. With one of them, she shared an unequal emotional relationship that left her deeply damaged. Combining experiences and poems, Nadal brings to the surface the physical and emotional pain of a still misunderstood mental illness, both to raise awareness of the desolation it entails and to demonstrate that one can overcome it.

It has been almost five months since He made public that he had been diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. How are you doing?

— I feel like I'm living a very different reality than I was then, or even a year ago. Emotionally, I'm better than ever because I'm worse physically. Everything is so uncertain, and there are so many symptoms that are difficult to understand, that I don't have as much space to listen to the emotions of my heart. In this sense, I'm calmer, but it's because there's a physical burden that's still not completely stabilized.

Is the book a turning point in a stage of your life?

— Absolutely. It was a commission I received four or five years ago, and one I never quite accepted. I was in the mood, but I wanted to write from a place of serenity, reflection, not vengefulness or clamor. The MS diagnosis coincided with the final draft of the book. Both have served as a turning point from the most fragile, deepest, saddest part of a past that was already weighing heavily on me. Brighter things suit me.

Until now, you've never publicly shared everything that happened to you during your adolescence and youth, your history of what you call "unbalanced love." How do you feel about going public?

— I don't really talk much about it, because it's primarily a book about anorexia. To tell it in a more emotional, less superficial way, I had to delve into this most traumatic part of my story. I'd sung and recited about unbalanced love, but I'd never spoken about it. They are the source of the main wound and what makes me realize the symptoms of anorexia. Not knowing how to love well, or having been rejected, or having been in unbalanced relationships, I link it to not having a good relationship with food.

Why do you define them as "unbalanced loves"?

— Because they are. I haven't experienced any abuse. These are unbalanced loves, with very different maturity, intelligence, and life stages. There's an imbalance of experience, self-esteem, strength, and security. We were in very different places, but this isn't a story of abuse or criminal acts.

She talks about the idealization she felt when she was 17 or 18 toward a man who was 50 and with whom she ended up sharing a romantic relationship, and says that the fascination he aroused in her was "a poison." Her experience makes me think of those teachers who use the admiration of their students to encourage a sexual relationship and in cases such as the Lleida Theatre ClassroomHave you thought about the similarities?

— Yes. There are different types of teachers: those inside the classroom and those on the street, those in the classroom, those in the classroom, or whatever. I'm not saying that more crap happens in the artistic field than in other fields. In fact, good things happen too. But in school, there are limits and rules. When mastery takes place in a more liberal space, there are no regulations. And young people don't know where to stand either. In that sense, consent is more diluted. In abuse and aggression, we are very clear about this, but when there is a situation of imbalance of knowledge and experience, we enter a series of gray areas where consent is more hidden.

At one point in the book, she says that after her story, the man repeated the same pattern with other girls, and says he continued "piling up victims."

— Yes, because they're probably people with pathologies who repeat patterns with those they meet along the way. And perhaps we've also had some pathology, and that's why we're attracted to them. But the blame should always fall on the older person.

How have you dealt with the guilt, the feeling that part of the responsibility for everything that happened to you falls on you?

— I let everything that happened to me happen. No one forced me to go anywhere. I had a poetic, musical, and sentimental curiosity. Conventional life seemed insufficient; I needed something more. It also gave off the image of a more mature and stronger girl. I wanted to experience it and thought it wouldn't affect me. These are experiences that hurt, but you only realize it by how you feel afterward.

Just last week, the writer and psychologist Leticia Asenjo I wrote in the ARA Leemos about his book and spoke of the "complicit silence" of the environment at the time.

— I'm grateful to Leticia for reading the book and coming to the presentation. She addresses many issues of abuse from a psychological perspective. I thanked Leticia with a message, although there are things we don't see the same way. Reactions I don't want to hear about. I don't want anyone connected to my past to write to me.

She explains that the anorexia she suffered from was linked to a series of triggers, such as this romantic relationship, but there were others as well. Why did she approach the topic from this perspective?

— Because I wanted to explain that it's not just a physical illness; the most serious thing is how you feel inside. Thinness is so visual that it's frightening, and it should be, because it's a deadly disease. But, internally, anorexia is still very misunderstood. It's an emotional illness, one of sensitivities and hypersensitivities that affects many girls and boys with potential.

He composed four albums (Teachers and friends, Return to mother, First architecture and In the name of the wound) during hospital stays. How did he do it?

— Well, I don't know. Music and poetry have always been my way of relating to others. I probably don't talk to people much; I mostly sing or recite. One of my life's impulses was to continue giving concerts and recordings, but at one point I had to stop because I didn't have the strength or serenity. It's true that I've done many things while sick, but this doesn't minimize the severity of the illness, which is devastating. At first, you're numb and that makes you hyperactive, but then the downturn comes. You can't endure this physical and mental situation for too long.

One of the most beautiful moments in the book is when he explains his relationship with his mother, the poet Montserrat Aldrufeu.

— I owe many good things to my mom. She gave me a vision of the world, talked to me about art, poetry, painting, and accompanied me to concerts. And she has protected and cared for me a lot to this day. We have a very beautiful relationship, somewhat like friends, and a history that has given a lot of meaning to my struggle, my health, and my existence.

Poetic justice close the door on that painful past. Where are you headed now?

— I continue with the show Ivette Nadal sings to the galacticosIt's great that they've proposed it to me now, because it's a somewhat uncertain time for my health. I'd like to listen to songs that aren't so sad, to get out of my own skin a little. We'll be doing some concerts (July 7 in Cadaqués, for example) and I've recorded an album that will be released in September. All this is helping me see if, through it, I can catch a bit of that spirit of going further, of seeking a more universal message when singing.