For this medium, health issues aren’t always one-size-fits-all

Jonathan Mark shares his journey losing friends to testicular cancer and suicide

As a medium, daily life can be exhausting. Spirit comes through wherever and whenever it wants so I learned to ignore it when necessary so I can decompress. I talk about death every single day, so it’s essential that I keep my own mental health in check.

During the pandemic, I’ve been taking fitness a little more seriously. I like to balance the readings that I do with some stuff for my mental health. I always try to mediate every morning and then I go for a run to clear my head.

After losing several close friends to suicide and depression, I try to encourage men to also stay on top of their mental health. There shouldn’t be a stigma that you’re weak if you feel a certain way. It’s nice to see men taking it more seriously and that more people have been more open about it and are helping themselves.

Men’s health is so often overlooked and that needs to change. My brother’s best friend passed away from testicular cancer and it really made me look more closely at the disease since he was only 24. He was the kindest person. He was very fit. He was a rugby player and it just took him by storm. It forever changed my perspective on a lot of things regarding testicular cancer and getting checked for it frequently.

His death made it very much more real to me than it ever had been and so I’ve been pretty active in a sense of preaching to men that I read from professional athletes to every day people to get everything checked out because you just never know. We never guessed that this was going to happen.

When I lost a close friend to suicide in ninth grade, it made me realize how essential mental health is how it can be deceiving sometimes. Kids can come from amazing homes and have wonderful families and they still have these issues. It also made me realize that someone who always has a smile on their face could still be in so much pain. And we don’t know how they’re really feeling. I lost two friends to suicide in high school and while I didn’t connect with them when they passed at first, I connected with them later on. I spoke to their families about it. It shed some light on how they really were feeling and what they were going through that no one knew about.

That’s one of the most rewarding parts of being a medium is being able to provide closure to people that need it. It feels great to be giving answers and making them feel they’re talking to their loved ones and helping them take a step forward. There’s a lot of readings I do that are life changing for people. It changes their perspective on what had happened and brings awareness and provides answers regarding the person who passed away and the person who is still here. It gives the reassurance that they’re ok.

I wanted to get involved with Movember because I love how they’re bringing awareness to testicular cancer, prostate cancer, and mental health issues and I want to be part of that community.

Many men feel fell they have to be strong and can’t share problems and I think it’s amazing that this campaign is helping people express it to a community that is very passionate about helping with this. It’s very powerful to me because I have lost people from both ends of the spectrum so I just think it’s amazing and I’m so honored to be a part of it.

Being a medium has forever changed the way I view mental health because when someone passes away and the spirit comes to me, I can understand what they were feeling, what they went through, how they dealt with it and it kind of shows me the storyline of where it started, how it ended and the stuff that happened in between where they felt so alone. They couldn’t ask for help. They didn’t want to ask for help and I feel that’s a common theme I’ve seen. They’re afraid or ashamed to ask for help. I tell people who have loved ones who pass from suicide to always be aware of the mental health of everyone around them. Reaching out is key. I just want to help people.