Theo Burrell, the ceramics and glass specialist who joined BBC's Antiques Roadshow in 2018 and spent the last four years of her life refusing to be defined by a terminal diagnosis, died peacefully on Wednesday July 8, surrounded by her family, at the age of 39.
Her family shared the news on her Instagram account Saturday. "Neither she nor her medical team foresaw this happening quite so quickly," the statement read.
Burrell was diagnosed with glioblastoma, one of the most aggressive forms of brain cancer, in June 2022 at age 35, after months of severe migraines and neurological symptoms.
Doctors gave her 12 to 18 months to live. She lived four years. She used those four years to see her son Jonah start school, to marry her partner of 13 years Alex in an intimate Edinburgh ceremony on March 28, to undergo a second brain surgery in January after her cancer regrew, and to campaign tirelessly for better brain tumour research and government funding as a patron of Brain Tumour Research from 2023.
Two weeks before she died, she posted from the Lake District, a family holiday with Alex, Jonah and her parents, writing that she had "expected to live for 12-18 months" when diagnosed and had outlived every dark thought she'd had about what she would miss. "I was lucky enough to say I did. And no one can take that away from me."
She is survived by Alex and Jonah. The charity Brain Tumour Research called her "phenomenal, determined and truly inspiring." She was 39 years old.