Eiren Caffall was a very young girl when she learned about polycystic kidney disease (PKD) and the ways it had affected her family for generations.
The heritable PKD was part of her consciousness while she observed the ways her father and other family members endured dialysis and the other ravages of it—and died young. Most of her family members were dead by the age of 50 because of the disease.
Eiren Caffall was 22 years old when she herself was diagnosed. Even so, she made the decision to have a child.
Aligned with her family story, is the story of the ways in which marine life struggles to survive in a fast-warming marine ecosystem.
In trying to understand her own grief and the acceptance of her destiny as someone who has inherited PKD, she studies the marine life of Long Island Sound and the Gulf of Maine.
She examines the ways in which marine animals continue to exist. This idea connects her to an idea about her own existence and her will to keep living while accepting exactly who she is.
You can read more about Eiren Caffall here.
