Strange Girl Gaming

I’m back! So, I have been absent for the past few months due to both unfortunate circumstances and an ever-growing career.

Let me explain the bad reason for my absence, on December 20th 2019 my wonderful mum was re-diagnosed with cancer – she had battled ovarian cancer for five years. Unfortunately, she deteriorated quickly, by Christmas Eve she was in the hospital.

She seemed to be improving for the first few days, we thought she just had an infection – sepsis. However, we soon learned her cancer had actually spread to her spine and possibly her brain – she had a bleed on the brain but we were never told what caused it.

My mum fought so hard, right till the end, she was a fighter. But, her body had been through so much in five years and her platelet levels were too low for her to begin chemo, meaning she could not fight the cancer. She was hit with many problems at the same time, sepsis, low platelets, a brain bleed, and aggressive cancer.

We were told she could have a few months left on January 7th – she had been in the hospital for two weeks – but she sadly passed away two days later on January 9th. I firmly believe my mum waited for her mother to arrive from California, my grandma arrived on January 8th – the day before we lost my mum.

There is so much I could write about my mum and her last few weeks (my mum in general really). Maybe someday I will, but for now, I will just say that I have never experienced pain like this. I have learned that there is no right way to grieve – I have my okay days but then I have my awful days.

I was so proud to call Maxine Partleton my mum, she raised me single-handedly and I will be forever grateful to her. All I can do now is hope I make her proud, and continue to live my life doing all the fun things she would want me to do.

Cancer is a cruel and unforgiving disease that has riddled my family for five years, starting with my mum.

It doesn’t feel right to go from my mum to discussing my career, although as she told me many times she was proud of what I have achieved – I went to India in November for the India Game Developers Conference (one example of how hectic life got). So I have found myself trying to balance my job and blog too.

However, I am back, and I am committed to keeping this blog up to date with news, reviews, previews, collectors editions, etc.

Finally, I know that cancer affects many people. If anybody is struggling because a loved one is fighting the disease – my mum dubbed it the alien – then my DM’s are open. You can contact me through my blog or on Twitter. I would recommend Twitter as emails can get lost in the void.