Though her parents were artists Ana rejected a life of creativity, choosing instead to pursue her MBA. But after nearly a dozen years working in marketing and advertising and for the UN, she began to experience depression, anxiety, and an overwhelming sense of burnout.  While home nursing herself through the flu one day she began to write and all at once rediscovered a passion she had forgotten. Soon after her first novel From Barbie to Vibrator  was published in Croatia in 2008 and Austria in 2009. In 2010, she was awarded the prestigious Austrian State Grant for Literature for her second novel Titoland. 

In this episode Ana who is now a journalist and author, a podcaster and mother, shares her story of the painful scoliosis surgery she endured as a teenager, losing her home and country to war, and how she created a life for herself she wouldn’t trade for anything. Though she witnessed her husband battle cancer and lost her mother to lung cancer, Ana feels blessed and grateful for where she is today. She believes the ultimate goal in life is to find the one thing you’re meant to do and she wouldn’t change hers for anything, regardless of the experiences she’s gone through.

Ana Tajder is an award-winning author and journalist originally from Croatia and Austria. She published two memoirs: a female coming-of-age chronicle called “From Barbie to Vibrator,” and “Titoland,” about her childhood in Yugoslavia.

Ana’s work has been covered by dozens of media outlets in Europe, where she has given numerous interviews and been a guest on TV and radio shows as an expert in feminism, immigration, and diversity. She has published well over a hundred essays, articles, and interviews in English, Austrian, German, and Croatian newspapers, magazines, and journals. Ana recently launched her podcast “Thank You, Mama” in which she talks to women from all over the world about the most valuable lessons they learned from their mothers.