Life Foundation
The life and loss of our little brother Carlitos.
By all accounts, Carlitos was a happy and healthy young boy. He had a large group of loving friends, 3 sisters that he loved to torture, and he had all the toys he could ever want.
However, he was different from the other kids his age in one way. At the age of 11, Carlitos had tested at college level on his acuity testing. He was, for lack of a better term, a little genius.
This didn’t surprise his family. His parents had been buying him electronics, which he would tear down and then build into robots. His favorite was a little robot that would close his bedroom door behind him, and if anyone came in that was not him, would yell “INTRUDER ALERT, INTRUDER ALERT”.
Then Depression Crept In
A couple months after testing out at a genius level, Carlitos began asking his teachers and family. Questions like: What is the meaning of life? What is the purpose of life? These questions soon turned into: What good does humanity provide? Does humanity resemble a virus? Why do people just consume, destroy and then move on?
He wrote a paper on this exact topic and handed it into his english teacher, declaring that humanity is a virus, humanity does much more harm than good, and that life is pointless. His teacher gave him a 100, and noted “Don’t be so dark next time”.
His teacher then began having the class fill out a bucket list. He titled his list, “Things to do before I die”, and his teacher did not notice that everything on the list was immediate.
His list was to be done within the next couple of months, and he began crossing items off the list. His teacher saw this list diminishing, items begin crossed off, and on he went.
On a day that began like any other, where Carlito’s older sister would wake him up for school after she had gotten ready, she walked into his room and found his lifeless body. He was laying next to a note. His note stated “It’s no ones fault”.
It wasn’t until after his death, Carlitos sister was looking through his notebooks and found all of his notes. The school never notified the parents that their son had been writing down such troubling things.
A little boy with unlimited potential lost his life to depression, and he had the foresight to know that people would blame each other. He was right, it was no ones fault. We only wish we knew the signs to look for, to recognize that little Carlitos was going through such pain.
This is why we started Life Foundation, to teach parents and teachers the signs to look for to identify depression, and to give them the tools to successfully help these children in need.
