Cape Town – Many South Africans are still mourning the death of former radio host Mark Pilgrim, who succumbed to lung cancer after battling for nearly a whole year.
Pilgrim had wanted to create cancer awareness since he was 18 years old when he was first diagnosed with testicular cancer.
In a resurfaced interview with Medi Clinic, Pilgrim discussed how he was first diagnosed and shared a quote by Benjamin Franklin that would change his mindset, and life, forever.
“I was 18 years old when I realised something was wrong down in the sensitive area because a testicle started swelling,” he said in the 2014 video. “One of the reasons why I didn’t do anything about it, as an 18-year-old, I’d have to tell mom there’s a problem, and mom would want to look,” Pilgrim said.
He said he went through depression at some point but things later changed.
“I was reading a Time magazine – an article on Benjamin Franklin – and he said: ‘Some people die at 25, and they’re only buried at 75.’ I didn’t have an Oprah moment going, ‘Aha, I have an epiphany’, but it planted a seed, and I realised that my focus was wrong. I was waiting to die instead of embracing life. But in order to embrace life, I had to give myself a goal. My goal was to one day be on radio.”
Pilgrim revealed that because he didn’t get it checked out straight away, the cancer spread to his lungs and kidneys.
Naturally inclined to be a speaker, spreading a message of positivity, and inspiring others with what he had been through, Pilgrim was also a motivational speaker. His autobiography, Beyond the Baldness, was published in 2015 and is about never giving up, fighting back and chasing your dreams, News24 reported.
Pilgrim was diagnosed with stage four lung cancer in March 2022 and he would continuously update fans and followers on his social media, until his passing a few days ago.
Follow African Insider on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram
Picture: Instagram/@markpilgrimza
For more African news, visit Africaninsider.com
Compiled by Matthew Petersen
