At the end of 1999, when I was 21 years old, I was diagnosed with chronic renal failure; that same year, the disease took most of my vision, and I was put on the list of patients waiting for a kidney transplant. I received my transplant at the end of 2001. I still feel those two years were the most difficult of my life, but also the experience for which I am the
most grateful. On the one hand, I had to face my new reality as an individual in a perpetual state of illness. My “normal” life was interrupted suddenly by the diagnosis and has always felt unfinished. On
the other hand, kidney disease has forced me to discover my own fragility and mortality, and since the transplant, my life has been rich with deep joys and sorrows.
I often find myself thinking about that part of my life between my diagnosis and my transplant, a piece of time and space I left behind with friends, family and strangers who shared a moment of their lives with me, changing who I am today and my way of seeing the world. Another cycle that ended abruptly and hasn’t been closed.
most grateful. On the one hand, I had to face my new reality as an individual in a perpetual state of illness. My “normal” life was interrupted suddenly by the diagnosis and has always felt unfinished. On
the other hand, kidney disease has forced me to discover my own fragility and mortality, and since the transplant, my life has been rich with deep joys and sorrows.
I often find myself thinking about that part of my life between my diagnosis and my transplant, a piece of time and space I left behind with friends, family and strangers who shared a moment of their lives with me, changing who I am today and my way of seeing the world. Another cycle that ended abruptly and hasn’t been closed.
That nostalgia and need for closure led me back to Mexico City, where I was born, to revisit those people who were with me during those life?changing events. Some of the people have passed away, and their absence in this book breaks my heart. I wanted to thank them somehow and be with them again, but I hope that this very personal project will be enough.
