‘Below Deck Med’: Jessica More Says Yachting Is ‘Toxic’ for Her and Wouldn’t Return to the Show
Jessica More from Below Deck Mediterranean said she’s left yachting and likely wouldn’t return to the series if asked.
More said yachting fulfilled its purpose for her and even though the show gave her a platform, she’s not interested in doing more Below Deck. And while most cast members have said they’d love to do another season of the show, More isn’t the only crew member who isn’t interested in returning.
Jessica More says yachting was toxic for her so she won’t return to ‘Below Deck’
A fan asked if she’d return to the show. “I don’t know if I would,” More said in a video in her Instagram stories. “I am working to try to transition out of yachting. Below Deck, probably not. Could I see myself doing some other kind of show or movie? Yes.”
“So yachting served its purpose,” she continued. “I got out of debt, I met amazing people. [And] I got on an amazing reality show. It gave me a platform. But at this point and phase in my life, it’s pretty toxic for me. So yeah, I found myself getting stuck and partying. And drinking a lot and just dating the wrong men in the industry. And it’s just not in a good place where I wanna be now.”
She plans to embark upon a career as a yoga teacher
So what’s next for More? “Headed back to Florida this weekend and then to Nicaragua next week for a yoga teacher training for a month,” she wrote. “Super excited, I’ve heard it’s life-changing. I’m ready to make some big changes in my life and feel this will be a beautiful foundation.”
“I don’t have a home technically,” she admitted. More added that most of her belongings and vehicles are in a storage unit in Fort Lauderdale, FL. “And I haven’t really found my place yet. Home is where the heart is, I guess.”
More has spent the past few weeks in Tulum, Mexico, and met up with chief stew Katie Flood. She also shared how they connected. “I slid into her DMs a month or two ago and asked if she wanted to meet up for a drink,” More wrote. “The rest is history. Love her. She has an epic personality and a beautiful heart.”
Courtney Skippon is another cast member not interested in ‘Below Deck’
More isn’t alone in not wanting to return to Below Deck. Stew Courtney Skippon recently said it’s too late for her to go back and in fact, it would be embarrassing. “No, I think it’s embarrassing,” Skippon said on the Dear Reality, You’re Effed podcast. “I would have gone back right away. If Kate went back and they wanted me back as like a second stew again, I definitely would have done that right away. Because I feel like that’s a more natural progression.”
“But if you’re just like waiting around … you do sort of to an extent have to be,” she added. “Just like readily available for that. And that’s not cute for me. That’s like a guy that ghosted you. And then six months he’s like ‘You up?’ And you are like, ‘I’m absolutely up.’” She added, “Yeah, no.”
‘Below Deck’: Courtney Skippon Said She’d Never Go Back to the Show – ‘It’s Embarrassing’
Unlike a slew of former cast members, Courtney Skippon said she wouldn’t consider another season of Below Deck, citing that it would be embarrassing to go back.
She also shared that she got along well with chief stew Kate Chastain and Captain Lee Rosbach because they both understood her sense of humor.
Returning to ‘Below Deck’ would be like going back to a boyfriend who ghosted you
Skippon chatted with Hannah Ferrier from Below Deck Mediterranean on Ferrier’s Dear Reality, You’re Effed podcast. Ferrier asked her if she’d go back and Skippon replied, “No I wouldn’t.” She added that she wouldn’t even return for a week either.
“No, I think it’s embarrassing,” Skippon said. “I would have gone back right away. If Kate went back and they wanted me back as like a second stew again, I definitely would have done that right away. Because I feel like that’s a more natural progression.”
“But if you’re just like waiting around … you do sort of to an extent have to be,” she added. “Just like readily available for that. And that’s not cute for me. That’s like a guy that ghosted you. And then six months he’s like ‘You up?’ And you are like, ‘I’m absolutely up.'” She added, “Yeah, no.”
Kate Chastain and Captain Lee got her sense of humor
She also said she really didn’t remember the filming process. Below Deck Season 7 was filmed during the winter of 2019 in Thailand. It began airing in Oct. 2019. “Because you are so tired,” she said. “I don’t think people recognize like how on another planet you feel the entire time.”
Skippon acknowledged that viewers didn’t take to her dry sense of humor at first. But it was a big reason why she got along well with Rosbach and Chastain. “Because if you are doing the thing that you say you don’t wanna do, I don’t think it really matters,” she said. “And certainly Captain Lee and Kate were both into that type of humor as well. Because they don’t wanna be there either. They would rather be having a drink with me too.”
“So why are we gonna pretend?” she asked. “I think it’s toxic to pretend you do want to be there all the time.” She added about the experience, “Because it’s exhausting. I was like this will be fun. It’s not like I’m taking my yachting career very seriously. I worked on one other yacht for like three months. And then accidentally got drunk and applied for a reality TV show. So it’s not being passionate.”
She shared that a ‘Below Deck’ camera operator called her a ‘brat’
Skippon also recalled the Below Deck experience being a little abrasive. In addition to navigating a confusing relationship with deckhand Brian de Saint Pern, she shared that some of the production crew weren’t very supportive.
Skippon often looked annoyed and almost pained when the crew would go out and get drunk. She tweeted that a camera operator referred to her as a “brat” when she refused to get drunk. “When we join the show, it’s specified that we *have one job* and are paid only for our role on the boat, not on TV,” she tweeted in 2020. “After our last day of filming we are taken (hungover) back to the boat to film promo videos (dancing, ripping shirts off deckhands, etc..) .”
“I questioned why I wasn’t paid for this entire extra day of embarrassment and was reluctant to participate in something that I A) didn’t want to do, B) wasn’t paid to do (ongoing theme),” she remarked. “The camera guy kept mumbling things under his breath and calling me a brat (FOURTH WALL).”
She added, “We eventually got to bickering about how although I was not paid to do it, I would in fact hand over my entire pay (and firstborn child) to not have to. His reply was that I should give it to him because I was making his job (the one he was paid to do) harder.”
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