I discovered she was a very brave woman when my father got sick
Cuando la pérdida reordena una familia, a veces revela lo que siempre estuvo presente pero nunca del todo visto. El presentador Roberto Leal y su madre Mercedes Guillén han convertido el duelo por la muerte del padre en 2019 en un punto de partida: juntos recorren el mundo en un nuevo programa televisivo, 'Nos vamos de madre', buscando no tanto la aventura exterior como el reencuentro interior. Es la historia antigua de cómo el dolor, cuando se comparte, puede transformarse en vínculo.
- La muerte del padre de Roberto Leal en diciembre de 2019 dejó a su madre sola ante el reto de reaprender a vivir tras décadas de vida en pareja.
- El duelo actuó como lente: Leal vio por primera vez con claridad la valentía de su madre, una mujer que siempre estuvo ahí pero a quien nunca había observado del todo.
- Madre e hijo decidieron transformar esa nueva percepción en acción, embarcándose juntos en aventuras por el mundo ante las cámaras de televisión.
- Mercedes Guillén reconoce que en su familia el amor no se declara con palabras, sino que se demuestra con presencia, y el programa se convierte en prueba de ello.
- El formato apunta a algo más profundo que el entretenimiento: es un intento de dos personas de aprender a verse mutuamente en un capítulo de vida que ninguno eligió.
Roberto Leal lleva dos décadas siendo una de las caras más reconocibles de la televisión española, desde Operación Triunfo hasta Pasapalabra. Pero fue fuera del plató, en diciembre de 2019, donde vivió el momento que más lo ha marcado: la muerte de su padre tras una larga enfermedad.
Ante esa pérdida, su madre Mercedes Guillén tuvo que aprender a moverse sola por un mundo que hasta entonces había recorrido en compañía. Leal la observó y descubrió algo que no había sabido ver antes: una mujer de una valentía genuina, capaz de encontrar el equilibrio sobre un suelo que se había movido bajo sus pies. "Descubrí que era una mujer muy valiente cuando mi padre enfermó", confesó en una entrevista con la revista Semana.
Esa revelación se convirtió en el germen de un proyecto inesperado. Juntos han creado 'Nos vamos de madre', un programa en el que recorren el mundo enfrentándose a retos y aventuras. La premisa es sencilla, pero el trasfondo es más íntimo: un hijo y una madre aprendiendo a estar juntos de una manera nueva, después de que el duelo lo haya reorganizado todo.
Mercedes Guillén ha sido honesta sobre lo que supuso ese período. Y también sobre cómo es su relación con su hijo: una en la que el afecto no se expresa con declaraciones, sino con gestos, con presencia, con la disposición a subirse a un avión y ver qué viene después. El programa que han hecho juntos es, en el fondo, el retrato de dos personas que están aprendiendo a verse de nuevo.
Roberto Leal has spent two decades building a reputation as one of Spain's most reliable television voices. He guided contestants through Operación Triunfo, kept audiences sharp with Pasapalabra, and became the kind of presenter people trust to show up and do the work. But the person who taught him how to show up, he says, revealed herself most fully when everything fell apart.
In December 2019, Leal's father died after a long illness. The loss reshaped the household. His mother, Mercedes Guillén, faced not just grief but the practical weight of learning to move through the world alone after decades of partnership. Leal watched this unfold and saw something he hadn't fully recognized before: his mother's capacity to endure, to keep moving, to find her footing on ground that had shifted beneath her.
"I discovered she was a very brave woman when my father got sick," Leal said in an interview with Semana magazine. The observation carries the weight of genuine surprise—the kind that comes when someone you've known your whole life suddenly comes into focus. It wasn't that his mother had changed. It was that he had finally seen her clearly.
That recognition became the foundation for something unexpected. Leal and his mother decided to make a television program together. Nos vamos de madre—the title plays on a Spanish idiom, roughly "we're going wild with mom"—sends them around the world undertaking challenges and adventures. The format is simple: two people, a camera, and the space to know each other better. But the subtext is more delicate. This is a son and a mother learning to be together in a new way, after loss has reorganized everything.
Mercedes Guillén has been candid about what that loss cost her. She describes the period after her husband's death as genuinely difficult, though she has had her family's support. What she and her son have discovered, though, is that their bond has always been there—just expressed in a language that doesn't rely on words. "We're not the kind of people who say 'I love you,' but we show it," she explained. There is something both matter-of-fact and tender in that admission. Some families speak in declarations. Theirs speaks in presence, in shared meals, in the willingness to get on a plane together and face whatever comes next.
The relationship between them was never fragile. But grief has a way of clarifying what matters. For Leal, it meant seeing his mother not as a supporting character in his life but as a fully realized person—someone with her own courage, her own capacity to rebuild. For Guillén, it meant discovering that her son could be a companion in this new chapter, not just a child she had raised. The show they've made together is, in that sense, a document of two people learning to see each other again.
Citas Notables
I discovered she was a very brave woman when my father got sick— Roberto Leal
We're not the kind of people who say 'I love you,' but we show it— Mercedes Guillén
La Conversación del Hearth Otra perspectiva de la historia
When you say you discovered your mother was brave, what did that look like in the moment?
It wasn't dramatic. It was watching her get up every day after my father died, watching her figure out how to be alone in a house that had always had two people in it. The bravery was in the ordinary things—the small decisions to keep going.
And that changed how you saw her?
Completely. I'd always loved her, of course. But I think I'd seen her as my mother, not as a person with her own strength. Grief has a way of stripping away those assumptions.
Your mother mentioned you don't say "I love you" much. Does that feel like something missing?
No, I don't think so. We show it instead. We're together now, making this program, traveling, facing things together. That's how we say it.
What do you hope people see when they watch the show?
That families don't have to be perfect or say all the right things. We're just two people who've been through something hard, learning how to be together in a new way. If that resonates with someone, that's enough.