About Thea
Thea (pronounced ‘Tea-ah’) has been passionate about art most of her life. As a toddler she would scribble on paper with such purpose. In preschool years she took to drawing princesses, mostly mermaids - starting with short bodies and long stick legs, progressing from there.
There was quite an attention to detail with many of her drawings through the years. One of my favourites was her group picture of Monsters vs. Aliens characters. At five years old she would sit at my computer and draw Moshi Monsters characters, copying what she saw on the screen. Fan drawings became a thing with her soon after, much like her preschool Princess drawings a few years earlier. She would spend countless hours drawing her favourite My Little Pony and Monster High characters, many times creating her own versions for fun.
Her next step was creating her own characters and story, "Stars Align". Through her Instagram she has introduced the characters and a prequel story using comic pages. We have watched her grow in her talents, and she constantly pushes herself to see what she can do next.
Over the years she has dabbled in many art means: clay, painting, sketching, copic marker drawings and digital (her favourite).
I would be remiss to not speak on her health and how art has been an escape for her through the years as well. Anxiety, Depression, ADHD, Autism, Connective Tissue Hypermobility Joint Disorder (unknown type) and Tourette's are all official diagnoses she has been given. Sadly the ADHD and Autism went undetected until she was sixteen and 19 (respectively).
Thea's first diagnosis was anxiety as a tween. Due to a negligent (at the time, when it came to Thea) Child Psychiatrist, we went a year without knowing. Near the end of grade eight Thea began struggling more. Her mental health was causing countless physical health issues, to the point she was missing quite a bit of school. One day, with only a few weeks left until her last year of elementary was over, she broke down minutes after I dropped her off to school. I had to pick her back up and she missed the last part of grade eight, barely making it to graduation. A month later the depression diagnosis was made. She often has moments of downs with both anxiety and depression.
It wasn’t until the pandemic happened that a child psychiatrist (the same one who diagnosed her depression) confirmed there is ADHD as well. With the Autism it was a pediatric neurologist that confirmed it for her. Unfortunately we learned that many girls go undiagnosed for years as their symptoms are not the same as typical boy symptoms.
The one thing, through it all, that has been a constant for her…is art. It is something she has been able to get lost in. Something she has been able to hyper focus on. Something that gives her a sense of meaning and purpose. Something she truly loves doing. It has given her a wonderful online community to connect with and other teens that understand her and have the same likes and interests.
Through the connections she made with fellow artists she gained a best friend, eventually becoming her girlfriend, who she virtually communicates with daily. She lives in another country but they make it work.
There have been a few times her mental health has been so bad it affected her being able to draw, sometimes for weeks. It is heartbreaking to see her in that state because she loses the one thing that grounds her most.
There are times she does need to walk away for a bit. Sitting for hours working on her art tablet comes with a painful price needing pain medication and rest. Her life is quite the roller coaster, but she lives it to the best of her abilities, prayerfully one day her hard work will pay off and her dreams of having her own graphic novel and people falling in love with her characters will come true!
TheaArtsz Website
The idea of this website came as a means to help Thea raise money for things needed to make her dreams come true. We have altered the path to be more "health friendly" making that less of a concern (but of course we still do need to raise money to pay for the graphic novels and voice actors - see the Stars Align page to learn more about that).
Thea has just recently (January 2023) completed her high school education, but it was not an easy task with her health. She persevered and we are all so very proud of her! She is still unable to work a traditional type job, and is on a disability pension. Running her home based business of TheaArtsz (sales mostly right now) takes a lot out of her and it is truly a group effort she achieves with family by her side. We lovingly do it because we believe in her talents and want nothing more than to see her dreams fulfilled however we can make them possible.
We hope that sales made through this website will help with raising enough money to cover Volume 1 printing costs along with paying our voice actors for Volume 2. This is my small way of doing the best I can to help her.
Any and all support for Thea and helping in making her dreams a reality is greatly appreciated. There are so many things we will be sharing through this website so we hope people will continue to join us in our journey.
Acknowledgements
There are so many to thank for helping to support her dreams and help in her artistic journey. Thea’s family, friends and teachers have been such a wonderful cheer squad of her talents along the way. Her grandpa has worked many hours making this website a reality. www.darkhorsedesigns.ca has graciously offered free hosting in support as well. To see the encouragement of those surrounding her warms my heart and makes us both feel so grateful.