IDAHO CITY, Idaho — Casey Carlisle served in the Marine Corps, but tragically he took his own life in 2018 and shortly after his father created Casey's Smile to raise awareness for suicide prevention.
Every year friends and family gather in the Idaho mountains for a weekend of camping, socializing and off-roading, it's called Wheeling for the Struggle.
"I took our off-road community which is called 4LO Idaho offroad and our suicide awareness group I started in 2018 after my son took his life and sort of merged them together to bring awareness," said Carlisle.
It's a way to remember Casey, but Wheeling for the Struggle also aims to to help the next generation and anyone dealing with depression, anxiety or other mental health issues by getting everybody together in the Idaho outdoors.
"I do enjoy that part a lot, but I think it is more important for suicidal awareness," said teenager Christian Hendricks. "Personally, I’ve got lots of friends who are suicidal and they always come to me about it."
Every year Wheeling for the Struggle has seen more people coming out to the woods for an off-road adventure, but Hendricks says it is the socializing aspect that really helps put everything in perspective and gives him the tools to help his friends.
"I kind of just have to talk to them about it and tell them things will get better," said Hendricks. "You just have to work through the struggle and get yourself out in places like this with people who feel the same way and talk things through, just realize there is an end goal where things will get better."
When this group of friends and family packs up on Sunday they will clean up their campsite and look for others to clean up as well, it's their effort to protect the Idaho forest.
They invited the Boise County Sheriff out on Saturday as on member told us, we are a bunch of rednecks willing and wanting to help, they also have plans to build an off-road vehicle for the Sheriff, but those plans are in the early stages at this point.
