Zsazsa Padila on life with and after Dolphy

She is probably the most photographed and most interviewed Filipina of 2012, what with the life-changing year she has had. Tagged as the “Divine Diva,” she has rendered many unforgettable songs and taken on many memorable roles on television and film, but for the viewing public, the most remarkable role she has taken on is that of life partner and “rock” to comedy king Dolphy.

Here are 10 things you should know about Zsazsa Padilla.

1. Zsazsa admits she never dreamed of being a singer and didn’t consider herself to be ambitious. “I didn’t even think I was smart enough to pursue anything. When I was in college I realized, wow, I can really be somebody if I really worked hard pala.”

It was in college that she finally learned to appreciate school, and ironically, when she became a mother at 16, it was school that had to take the backseat. “I was 18 when I started singing professionally, and I had K (her eldest daughter Karylle), then I was studying. It was just so much pressure and I had to give up one. And I felt then I had enough education to back me up ‘cause I went to college for three years,” Zsazsa reveals. “I was singing already and I discovered that was what I wanted to pursue in life.”

She is the fourth of six siblings raised by sportsman father Sonny Padilla and housewife mother Kating, and says it was very hard to put all of them through school. “When I was growing up, I totally had no respect for what my mom was doing. When my classmates would say their mom was a doctor I’d be so impressed. I would say, ‘My mom’s a housewife lang.’ Nila-lang ko lang before. Until I became a mom and realized, it is hard work.” 

She clearly remembers walking in the hallways of Roosevelt High School in San Juan, thinking that this was not the life for her. “We were not even middle class, we were poor. And I remember very, very embarrassing moments there like being called in class during examination, and being told you can’t have the exam kasi di ka pa bayad,” she recalls. She shares that she used to play in the canals of San Juan and catch fish with her bare hands. “I don’t know how I did and I don’t know how I survived it without galis! But I really had a fun childhood.”

2. Love advice from Zsazsa: On falling in love early in life: “It’s just very challenging to stay in a marriage right now. I see couples who are like ‘Oh, I’m so in love,’ then all of a sudden, ‘Oh my, what happened there?’ I have to say really, really think about it,” she says. She reveals her daughter Karylle, 31, is already thinking about marriage, but jokes, “I kinda brainwashed all of them.” On what she wishes she knew when she was 16, she says: “Although I love K to bits, (I wish I knew) not to marry young talaga, don’t go there, no.”

On falling for much older men: “That’s hard. The generation gap kinda gets to you after a while. Sometimes you outgrow a person, and in my first marriage I felt I outgrew my first husband, that’s how I saw it, why we separated,” she reveals. Zsazsa had a 36-year age gap with Dolphy, and knew all along that age was really going to catch up. “But Dolphy was just so precious,” she says. “It really depends. For some that I’ve seen, it really works.”

On the one advice she gives her daughters: “Never with a married man. Never, ever. Not even with one who is in a relationship.”

3. Zsazsa and Dolphy’s daughter Nicole knew as early as preschool that she was adopted. After two years of trying to get pregnant and finally giving up, they found out they were pregnant with youngest daughter Zia.

“Nicole was four already, but she didn’t understand what it meant. It only affected her when other kids would start whispering and say she was adopted,” she shares. Zsazsa says it was her idea to tell Nicole about it at an early age. “Being a child of celebrities, it’s something that should not be a secret,” she explains. “There was a time that she couldn’t even say it. It was the ‘A’ word.” On how she helped Nicole through it: “I was just constantly talking to her, telling her it was really God’s way of bringing her into our lives, and it’s a fact.

“I cried talaga, ‘Oh finally, thank you Lord,’” Zsazsa recalls of the time she found out she was pregnant with Zia. “She was my second pregnancy so it was hard, it was really a struggle,” she shares. “It was my dream to have twins, so I’d dress them alike. They were always mistaken as fraternal twins.”

Today, Karylle, Nicole and Zia have a great relationship, but that wasn’t always the case. “K went through healing talaga, it was hard because she would see it from a distance,” she says. “Zia and Nicole naman, they couldn’t understand what was wrong, why they weren’t able to be in touch with Karylle, because they grew up with many brothers and sisters from different mothers.”

4. On looking back at Dolphy and regrets: “No matter how many beautiful memories we had together, of course you still have regrets like, sana wala na lang emo moments when we fought.”

“Of course, out of the 23 years, there were years that were not so good, or had problems,” she shares. “The years really have gone by so fast. Parang you just wish you could have had more time, but I think we really spent it well.

“Every day I cry. I have to cry every day just so I can get by. I find that if I cry in the morning and talk to him, it’s healthier than having to sleep with a heavy heart.” She starts every morning with a cup of coffee by her balcony. “Lovey, I hope you don’t mind but this is ‘our time.’ Whatever you are doing in heaven, just stop it, I need to feel your presence so that I’ll be strong. So that I can get on with my day,” she shares. “I don’t feel alone. ‘Cause I don’t feel that need to have a partner yet. I’m not saying I never will, but, you don’t want to be wallowing in self pity saying you’re alone.”

5. On getting along with the Quizon family: “When I felt myself competing, I stopped. Why should I feel this way and why am I competing?”

More than being a struggle, Zsazsa describes the journey of her relationship with the Quizons to be that of overcoming insecurity. “There was a time that so much would be said about what this family has and what that family has, and you feel like you’re in competition. Nobody had the nerve to come up to you and say why did my father give you this or that,” she reveals. “In retrospect, you think, of course this is all hearsay, chismis, bakit ka nagpapa-apekto?”

At the start of Zsazsa and Dolphy’s relationship, it was Vandolph whom she was closest to because he was living with them. “You know there would be times that we’d be okay, there were times there would be struggles. Basta we’d all come together, sadly, during a family crisis. There’s something about that situation that really gels everyone together.”

6. Zsazsa admits to having gone through depression when she turned 40. “If I didn’t go through what I did at 40, I’d probably be doing that now, having lost Dolphy.”

“I really lost 20 pounds, I was totally depressed. Just sleeping, not eating, not doing anything really,” she reveals. “It started when we were supposed to get married, and hindi natuloy. It was so painful. It was just so, so painful.” She dealt with it by burying herself in work, going on tours, working more, but she admits she knew Dolphy would’ve rather had her stay home more. “That was one of the most difficult times, so now, I’m already cautious. I wouldn’t want to go there.”

On advice she would give 40-year- old Zsazsa, now that she is 48: “Just be easier on yourself, come on, there will be struggles that will be harder. 

“I’m looking forward to turning 50,” she exclaims.

7. She sees herself more as an actress than a singer in the next five or 10 years of her career, and she is looking forward to learning a new skill.

“I don’t know what it is yet,” she says. She reveals she has no skills when it comes to musical instruments (“We have a piano and a guitar, I tried that –– ugh!”), has no entrepreneurial skills (“I don’t think a business will work for me”), and would like to learn Spanish (“I’ve always wanted to learn that!”). “I’m very much interested in editing and cinematography, that’s something I would love to learn,” she shares. “Now that I have so much time, I’m looking forward to that.”

8. On aging: “In the business that I’m in, I have sponsors. People know I’m with Dr. Vicki (Belo). It’s more of an exercise to not ‘do’ so much. You learn how to say, ‘O, tama na.’”

“You can’t keep saying yes to everything that’s available there,” she smiles. When asked about vanity, she says: “The only time I look in the mirror now is when I do my makeup, or when I brush my teeth. You see me without makeup.” She says that aging doesn’t scare her, and that more than the physical, it’s how you feel. “It’s more of doing something and then you realize, you’re like, you’re tired.”

Two months after her surgery and the kidney cancer scare, she says she is committed to wellness. “My week is not complete without doing some kind of workout. I’m very conscious of what I put in my mouth. All fresh talaga, mostly organic and pescetarian. No more pork, beef, or chicken, just fish and shellfish.”

9. Zsazsa Padilla in numbers:

21: Number of total awards for both acting and singing, most of which came from her roles in Ako, Legal Wife and Batang PX.

3: Average number of times she goes out of the house in a week. “I hardly go out of the house, I’m really a homebody. And I can’t stand the traffic!”

59: Degree of curvature of her scoliosis, for which she got metal rods placed in her back in an operation in 1994.

10: Number of minutes it took for tattoo artist Jaime Tud to ink her “Lovey” tattoo.

569,941: Number of Twitter followers (as of press time) of her account, @zsazsapadilla

10. On the legacy she would want her and Dolphy’s relationship to leave: “That it’s hard to be judgmental about relationships.”

“When we started, everybody was against it. It was doomed from the onset. And then we survived 23 years,” she says with a smile. “You know how we did it? We would always talk and say, we’ve survived worse than this. This is nothing. Umpisa pa lang ang hirap na, and if you start a relationship that way, with the right mindset, you can weather any storm.”

“Alam mo yung tanong, yung ‘para kanino ka gumigising?’ Yun yun, eh,” shared a very emotional Zsazsa in an interview with Boy Abunda in The Buzz three months ago, after Dolphy passed away. 

Today, she answers that very same question with this: “For my family.” “You know when Boy asked me, ‘Are you lonely?’ I was surprised the question,” Zsazsa recalls. As she cried, the public cried with her. And as she grieved, every time she spoke, or even just stood in front of the camera, the public could not help but admire her strength and grace. Three months after, it still may be very difficult, but Zsazsa proves to be every bit a survivor. To everyone who may be going through something, anything, her words are: “The only way to survive really is to take it one day at a time.”

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