Spanish actress Ana Obregón drew widespread attention in 2023 after making the unconventional and debated choice to fulfill her late son’s last wish: having a child using his sperm through surrogacy.
Her son, Aless Lequio, died from cancer in 2022 at the age of 27. Following his passing, Ana shared that Aless had longed to become a father, a dream she was determined to realize on his behalf.
A year after his death, Ana welcomed a baby girl via surrogacy in the United States. She later clarified that the child, Anita, was not her own daughter but rather her granddaughter, conceived with Aless’s preserved sperm.
“This girl isn’t my daughter, she’s my granddaughter,” Ana explained to ¡Hola! magazine in April 2023. “She is Aless’s daughter, and when she grows up, I will tell her that her father was a hero so she knows who he was and why she should be proud of him”.
Now 70, Ana recently appeared on Spanish television, reflecting on the mixture of happiness and sorrow she experiences while raising Anita and still grieving her only son.
“My house is filled with stuffed animals and toys,” she said with a smile, according to The London Evening Standard. “I even have a small ball pit where she makes me dive in.”
However, Ana admitted that as Anita gets older, caring for her has become more physically demanding: “Lifting her is getting tougher on my back.”
Looking back on Aless’s diagnosis, Ana spoke honestly: “We go through life thinking we’re invincible, that nothing bad will happen to us. Then suddenly, at 25, you’re told you have an aggressive cancer. That’s not what you expect when you’re young.”
She also revealed that losing Aless has made her more anxious as a caregiver to Anita than she was with her son.
Ana’s choice to pursue surrogacy attracted significant public scrutiny—not only because of the circumstances, but also because surrogacy is illegal in Spain. Anita was born in the US, and Ana later adopted her, becoming her legal guardian.
In previous interviews, Ana has spoken openly about her profound grief after Aless’s death, saying she felt “dead for three years.” It was only after Anita’s arrival that she began to feel alive again.
In a recent ¡Hola! interview for Anita’s second birthday, Ana shared: “I know I’ll never feel the happiness I had when Aless was with me again. That pain never fades. You don’t accept or get over a child’s death. You just learn to live with it.”
“Thankfully, Anita fills my days now,” she added. “I was dead for three years after Aless died until Anita was born… Life feels like a breath of fresh air.”