The View’ Star Ana Navarro Shares Her Husband’s ‘Very Personal’ Medial Diagnosis: ‘Tough Days’
Ana Navarro is opening up about a disease her husband has been living with.
On the Monday, September 14 episode of her Bleep! podcast, the political commentator, 54, revealed her husband, Al Cárdenas, was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease over two years ago.
The View cohost said the diagnosis “is very personal, and it is something that I have not wanted to talk about for many reasons.”
“I haven’t talked about it because it’s about him,” she explained. “Because I’m a public person, he’s not. He’s got a right to privacy.”
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The TV personality said another reason they kept the 78-year-old politician’s medical journey private is “because of the way that Parkinson’s patients get treated,” noting they often get “sympathy” from people, when in reality “nobody wants to be defined by this disease.”
As for the timeline of Cárdenas’ diagnosis, Navarro recalled, “I started noticing over two years ago that Al was a little more unstable on his feet,” and saw he was trembling, which led her to tell him to see a doctor.
However, Navarro said her husband “dragged his feet” about getting checked “for over a year, maybe more than that.”
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Eventually Cardenas got the Parkinson’s diagnosis, and Navarro confessed on the podcast, “I hold myself responsible because for that year plus, when I saw symptoms in him, I tried to explain them away.”
Since his diagnosis, Cárdenas has seen a neurologist and has been getting treatment, Navarro added.
“The difference that treatment makes is night and day. Since Al was diagnosed [and] started receiving treatment, his symptoms are practically unnoticeable,” she shared. “I’m not going to tell you that there aren’t some very, very tough days. There are. There are days when he’s off. There are days when he doesn’t have the energy level that he once did. But also there’s a lot of days that are good days.”