Kerry-Marie Callander has become one of NZ’s most in-demand psychic mediums, having published a book about her journey, worked on Sensing Murder, produced a podcast and given many, many private and public readings. Next month she begins a nationwide tour, hoping to connect with as many Kiwis as possible, giving them peace and comfort from the other side…
As a little girl Kerry-Marie Callander would see people in her room as she tried to sleep at night.
Afraid, she’d often end up in her father’s bed, snuggling up close to him to stay safe.
But talking about the frightening things she was seeing – and some unusual feelings she’d get – wasn’t an option. “Coming from a Catholic family, I was told there was no such thing as ‘boogie men’” she says. “No one understood it.”
That included Kerry-Marie herself. “I really didn’t understand it – I’d see people in my room and, of course, it was just frightening!”
Then, sadly, Kerry-Marie endured several years of abuse as a child, something she only came clean to her mother about when she was in her 20s – her mum asked her to please never tell her father. It was around the time of the abuse that her family believed she’d started making up an imaginary friend.
“Her name was Elizabeth and she had long dark hair and olive skin,” says Kerry-Marie. “She was the ultimate best friend. She was so supportive – she still is, because even today she comes around.”
Because Elizabeth, says Kerry-Marie, was in fact very real – she was a spirit, and would serve as her spirit guide.
One night, Elizabeth let Kerry-Marie know that her cousin had tragically passed away. “My cousin was killed in a car accident,” she says. “I knew before my family – I got up and told them and they told me to go back to bed. Sure enough, they later got the phone call from my uncle to say that he’d passed. We never talked about that again.”
But it was only in her 30s that Kerry-Marie started to explore the psychic world, and discovered her own talents.
After a marriage break-up, and a subsequent relationship fell apart, Kerry-Marie was feeling heartbroken. “I went for a psychic reading – as people do in those sort of circumstances – and my father came through, immediately. It was amazing.”
And so, she found herself returning to that psychic again and again. “It was fascinating what that medium gave me – there was absolutely no way she could have known that stuff about my dad and I found it very healing,” she says. “I was fascinated, but, at the same time it felt a bit naughty after my upbringing.”
She started to explore her own psychic abilities, undergoing international training – and now, some 25 years later, she is one of NZ’s most sought-after psychic mediums. She’s published a book, Breaking Free, about her psychic journey, appeared on the hit TVNZ show Sensing Murder, hosted The Spiritual Truths podcast – as well as working as a speaker and doing private psychic readings for clients.
Next month, she’s also kicking off a nationwide tour, visiting Whangārei, Auckland, Hamilton, Tauranga, Palmerston North, Wellington, and Christchurch.
She’s hoping to bring comfort, closure and healing – much like what she experienced after the passing of her father – to as many Kiwis as possible on the tour.
It’s a big responsibility, she says, because people often come to her during difficult – and vulnerable – points of their lives. She wants to make sure she can give them what they need – as well as some evidence that she’s the real deal.
“I don’t want to put anyone down, but I worry about some psychics and I worry about the training,” she says. “Because anyone can tell you anything and when people are vulnerable they’re very open to suggestion and it’s a real responsibility. I really like to be evidential with the information I’m giving to people.”
In her large group shows, she likes to start the show with a meditation. “I quietly connect, so we can sort of build the energy together,” she says. And then, it really all comes down to which spirits connect with her.
“I’ll describe that person – but then, because people can be similar in life, spirits can be as well, so we’ll go through a process of elimination, working out who they belong to,” she says. “Everyone’s listening, trying to work out if that’s their mum, or grandmother or sister, but finally that person knows without a doubt who it is, we have the evidence. And with this all done in a live audience, you get to see it unfold.”
That evidence can be something very small, but very meaningful. She recalls one show, where a man wandered into her make-up room holding a large glass of red wine, looking for the psychic show. She pointed him in the right direction, and then, later on stage she saw him raise his hand as she described a spirit who had came through. The description and things she was talking about matched his grandmother. “She said to me ‘pet’ and then ‘snow’, so I thought she was talking about a pet he – or maybe she – had called Snow,” says Kerry-Marie. “But he said, ‘no, that’s what she called me. My Grandmother called me Snow’. It was her pet name for him.”
Sometimes though, she says, that process of elimination can be harder than expect.
“I remember I had a mum who had passed with a brain tumor – she was short and I described what she looked like and her personality,” says Kerry-Marie. “Two people took her at the show, so then she showed me a white Mitsubishi car. But they both had a white Mitsubishi car! So, then I see there’s a dent in the back on the right hand side. They both still said it was the car. It doesn’t always happen like this – it stands out in my memory – because then I got the number plate right. I was getting more and more evidence – the mum said that her daughter had bought some silver sparkly shoes yesterday, which she had. So, she knew it was her, and, that was also very comforting, knowing that her mum could see what she’s doing and can still see and hear her in spirit.”
It’s a gift she says that most of us have there, ready to be developed, we just don’t tap into it. “It’s innate,” she says. “It’s just that I think some people are more talented or gifted in certain ways in it.”
All of us, she says, have had moments where we’ve got a gut feeling about something or had a thought come into our head. “Maybe you have a strong feeling you shouldn’t do something, but then we logic that thought away,” she says. “And then you’re kicking yourself later, because you just knew you shouldn’t do that. The thing is, this energy is quite subtle. You have to listen to those subtle energies.”
