When life gives you monsters, you make a game out of it
ST. JOSEPH, Mich. -- September is blood cancer awareness month and when Joe Welsh, a Saint Joseph Michigan native, was diagnosed with blood cancer, he came up with a way to spend time with his family during some dark times. He invented a board game called “Making Monsters!”
Now he is trying to share his invention with the world. The first prototype started with just pencil and paper. Joe Welsh, the creator explains, “I brought out pencil version of this game out to play with my three nieces and two girls and they were all yelling and telling me advice and playing it and that's kind of the environment we have had.”
His two daughters have helped with a lot of the process. His oldest Skylar Welsh explains that the game looks a lot different now than it did earlier in the year. She says, “there was no board in the middle, and there wasn't this sideboard at all. It was a bit more confusing to learn.”
No one is prepared for the day they hear they have cancer. This diagnosis led to a long road ahead for the creator of “Making Monsters” Joe Welsh. I got shocking news of non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, which is a pretty common blood cancer category, and I drove to a parking lot and cried. It was horrible.
There’s not a lot of current research out there for this form of blood cancer. In 2022, Welsh initially thought he would only have 3 to 5 years to live. Since then, he's gone through six months of chemo.
There is currently no cure for this form of cancer, but doctors tell Welsh it moves slow and can be treated like a chronic disease, allowing him to keep living life.
Before the diagnosis Welsh was always family oriented but this news made him realize time is precious. “I just want to be here watching my kids grow up. And it was a good news bad news situation from the standpoint of priorities, because all a sudden I didn't care as much about work, and I cared more about spending time with my kids.”
When going through chemotherapy, Welsh suffered some nerve issues that still impact his life today. He created the board game as an outlet for him to be able to spend time with his family.
Welsh tells ABC 57’s Sidney Moore, “It's a lot of pieces but it's what I'd call a light to medium family strategy game.”
The game has a Kickstarter campaign launching Sept. 16th and will be shared with the public in Spring of 2026.
According to the Mayo Clinic, symptoms of Non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma include swollen lymph nodes in the groin, neck, or armpits. Individuals also can experience extreme fatigue, night sweats, weight loss without trying, as well as stomach pain or swelling among other symptoms.