I know shouldn't but i have been reading #1reasonwhy and other women in games articles. I know it makes my blood boil but I do it anyway.
I feel like my illness and gender are the reasons I'm not currently in the games industry like i studied for....It makes me so mad! I want to write a whole blog post about it on my sick blog - but am ironically too tired.....
Raeding the tweet tags reminds me of how the guys i had to try work with would bitch about me behind my back. About how i was the worst programmer, how they hated they had me in their team (what a burden i was!), or "Why does she even bother to come in". Major end of diploma project the other programmers basically refused to work with me.
Infact it's amazing i still recommend AIE to people! I guess im mostly recommending it to cis white males in some way, that and the teachers were awesome and i loved learning about what i was learning :P It was more the other students and my illness that i struggled with.
I often burn out at the end of a term, about a week before the holidays when important stuff it due. By the end of teh year im allready spent so my first year of AIE was pretty good till the end of the year. I wasn't to behind, not the best programmer i was hoping i could be but still fairly capable. I did find i told more sexist jokes about women (they belong in the kitchen etc etc) as a defense i think. I was one of only 3 females in the programming class and the boys were more competitive than i was. I thought if i could out mysogise them id cope better.
Second year was going to be tougher in general - we would be starting to work with the art students and team work terrifys me at the best of times. I often worry about people relying on me when i am inherently unreliable because of my illnesses. So i step back to some kind of managerial role if i can, or program something non vital to the project.
But in early 2nd year i was lucky enough to *finally* get the laperoscopy i had been wanting for years to treat my Endomitriosis! Operation was one day, put me in bed for a month, in turn behind at school by too much, and triggered a flareup. Around this time my medication for my ADHD started to stop working for me making life more exciting as well!
I found myself less and less able to do some little things...like read. Or simple maths or logic problems. A *little* bit of a problem in a programming course.
My brain fog was bad, i did try to explain to my teammates when i could, and i was always apologizing for my uselessness. We had a major prototyping project i took a leader position in, i like to think it went pretty well. I think im pretty good at diplomacy which is what was needed a lot of the time. keeping others on track felt good, plus it gave me the time i needed for frequent breaks tither to the bathroom (yay diabetes) or cups of tea (yay panic attacks).
As i fell more behind everyone else, behind in my own goal, i got sicker and more depressed. Spontaneous suicidal thoughts started to pop into my head, almost like an impulse which scared me greatly. I start to see my shrink more frequently, but the panic attacks still get worse.
There was a huge oppertunity coming up for the 15 final project. The games company upstairs was going to do a special kind of joint project thing with some students. You had to put in a resume and do an interview to get involved.I submitted and did teh interview just for the sake of experience, i fully expected not to get a spot! Im not a strong programmer, I was in teh Avd. Dip not the bachelor etc etc. I wouldn't have chosen me - but they did.
The sick chick who cannot even code got a spot! I was blown away, the chaps we worked with from teh games company were awesome - they understood i had some limitations but saw what i could contribute and valued it. They wanted me to help manage them and design and organise best i could.
Our project involved using mac minis - i grew up with macs and have a macbook pro as my main computer at home. I also have a gaming/dev PC and happily use the PCs at uni. Despite the fact i all ready knew a lot about teh platform i went and did some market research off my own batt to help us with the initial design stage.
All of it was ignored. Anything I managed to stick to the project was undone if i was home sick. Even when asked for my opinion on a decision, it was often dismissed outright. Workign with people who wouldnt communicate with me, respect me, listen to me, was that straw that broke the camel's back.
I spent most of my energy just getting to class, and then staying "with it" enough to keep up appearances. I had to pull out of the team, i refused to put up with it all anymore. I moved to an upstairs team, away from the old group, but failed to do anything much there either, except learn that i in fact love to draw landscapes :P
i felt like such a waste of space. I was so close to dropping out so many times, but by teh bloody skin of my teeth, my amazing family, and good friends and teachers i somehow managed to get my Advanced diploma and graduate.
I still don't feel like i earned it but there it is! 2 years of my life, some ok programming skills and i got to meet some spiffy peeps.
My plan was to go straight back into the fire and study the 3d animation side of the adv. dip. the very next year. I deferred due to health, i also moved back home with my parents and brother. I did some web development, some relationship development, some personal development, some sewing development, and no game development in 2012. A weird breakup triggered the flare i'm still in now, and stopped my plans to go back to the AIE again.
This year i can't study, and unlike last year the idea of even part time work is impossible. Im on some crazy drugs like cortisone, and fianlly on something effective for my anxiety (could have used that one 3 or 4 years ago ;P ), but none of this really changes the fact im royally buggered. Lupus is kicking my ass!
BUT - this year have started to look at some other ways i can get back into game dev. Using software liek Gamemake and RPG Maker VX (it was on sale on steam! shiney ) helps me design stuff again. I dont need to program it all myself from the bottom up, i don't have to reinvent the wheel. It has been fun, but still very erratic and slow. Also doing my own texturepack for minecraft, and looking into how to do simple mods, has given me a feeling of "yeah i *am* still a programmer" and whatnot.
And using little tools like that still *counts*, i keep forgetting that. I need to remind myself that i still count and what i do still counts.
