Helping One Guy Honors Jon Sharkey

Jon Sharkey's life has been shaped by both heartbreak and hope. Behind his bright, contagious smile is a story marked by loss, pain, and unimaginable strength. From a young age, Jon was no stranger to sorrow. At just 14, he watched his mother, Gail, begin her nearly 20-year battle with metastatic colon cancer; a battle that defined much of his adolescence. While his mother fought with quiet strength, Jon faced another kind of fight at home. His father, was abusive, a presence that brought fear rather than comfort. But even through that darkness, Jon refused to let bitterness take root in his heart. Instead, he made a quiet vow to become the man his father never was.

Not long after Gail’s initial diagnosis, Jon’s father died of cancer. His death brought no peace - only the complicated ache of a son who’d never known the love he deserved from a father. Jon grieved in his own way, carrying the weight of trauma and unanswered questions, but choosing to move forward with compassion instead of cruelty. He didn’t let the pain harden him. He turned it into fuel to become a better man, a better human being.

Then in 2014, at the age of 34, Jon faced another devastating loss: the passing of his mother, Gail. She was his greatest supporter, his best friend, and the person he had always been able to lean on. Losing her shattered him. They had been all each other had for so long.

In 2017, he met Lisa. Two years later, they married, blending their lives and families together. Jon didn’t just become a husband, he became a father figure to Lisa’s three children: JD, Will, and Emma. They adored him. He poured himself into being a steady, kind, and loving presence for them.

In 2021, Jon and Lisa welcomed their twin boys, Jett and Maxton. Jon beamed with pride every time he looked at his sons. It was as if, after years of loss, life had finally opened a door to joy.

But that door was shaken again in March of 2024.

Lisa brought Jett to the ER after noticing troubling symptoms. Within hours, doctors confirmed the unthinkable: Jett, just 2.5 years old, had cancer. B-Cell Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia. Lisa couldn’t bring herself to tell Jon. After everything he’d been through, after losing both his parents to cancer, she asked the doctor to be the one to deliver the news.

And when Jon heard it, he didn’t fall apart. He didn’t run. He held Lisa as she held Jett. And he promised, through his pain, that he would give everything he had to his family.

And he has.

Every hospital visit, every appointment, every sleepless night, Jon has shown up. For Lisa. For Jett. For Maxton. For JD, Will, and Emma. Because that’s who Jon is. A man who keeps loving, even when life gives him every reason not to. A man who shows up for others, no matter the cost. A man whose smile, against all odds, still lights up every room he walks into.

Jon has carried more sadness than most will ever know. But he wears it with quiet grace, transforming pain into purpose. And even in his hardest moments, he finds a way to smile.

Because Jon’s story isn’t just one of loss, it’s one of love.