If Cuban writer and professor Enrique del Risco could give some advice to the healthy young man he was 25 years ago, he would say, “Stop eating all the bad stuff that you’re eating."
Del Risco, 56, recalls that when he came to the U.S. in 1997, he gorged on bagels, pizza, and all kinds of junk foods without thinking about the future, even though he had been warned of his susceptibility to developing diabetes because of his maternal family history.
The author, a confessed fan of black beans and seafood who is also known as Enrisco—a portmanteau of his first and last name—now realizes that “when you’re young, you feel invincible, immortal.” Eight years ago, he had some routine tests done, and even though he had no symptoms, he was diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes. “I went from being underfed in Cuba to wanting to eat and try everything,” says del Risco, who weighs 240 pounds, while his ideal weight would be 180. “I regret gaining weight because with it comes diabetes and other health problems,” he reflects. “But I was too hungry in Cuba to be hungry here, is what many Cubans say. You arrive and want to indulge yourself,” Del Risco explains.
Food, scarcity, and hunger have also been themes in his literature, as seen in his latest book, Nuestra hambre en La Habana (Our Hunger in Havana, Plataforma editorial, 2022). “I wrote Nuestra hambre en La Habana after I came out of hunger in Havana; I couldn’t have written that book there [while suffering from it]. One was not even very aware of what that hunger consisted of.” Right now, hunger is not a concern. The challenge is knowing how to deal with all the food surrounding him and limiting himself due to his illness.
While his illness was caught at a very early stage, and he has learned to control it, the New York University Spanish Department professor concedes that it changes your life forever. “It makes you more aware that you must limit yourself about many things,” he says. “I haven’t eliminated anything but restricted myself about a great many things.” Whenever he goes shopping, he reads the product’s ingredients on the label, choosing minimally processed ones, and avoids bread and rice. In addition to checking his glucose level every morning, taking his medicine, and developing healthy eating habits, the novelist believes staying physically active is essential. “Diabetes isn’t the end of the world if it’s kept under control.
CIRO GUTIÉRREZ