When she arrived at the scene, the paramedics were attempting to resuscitate Zen. He was duly whisked to the hospital, where he fought for his life for three days.
“By the third day, the doctors told me and my husband that there’s a very slim chance that Zen will pull through,” says Elaine. “I thanked him for choosing me as his mum for 17 years and 11 months… I saw tears rolling down his cheeks.”
Zen passed away that same night, with family and friends by his side. To honour him and his desire to help people, Elaine and her husband donated his organs.
“Zen took his own life,” says Elaine, “But he gave six back to six lives in Melbourne. He lives on in them.”
In the wake of Zen’s death, as Elaine searched for meaning behind her family’s tragic loss, she found an answer on his phone; he had written about wanting to be a psychologist.
“This gives me the idea of what I can do to find purpose in life for him and for me. And that’s when my husband and I decided to set up the Zen Dylan Koh Fund with Limitless,” says Elaine.
Limitless support to youth
The Fund provides free counselling for disadvantaged youths who fall into three categories.
These are children whose family cannot afford to pay the high cost of therapy, or who have parents who would not understand and hence would prefer not to know, because of stigma. The third group includes those whose families are in denial and refuse to pay for their kid to speak with a professional.
Limitless Co-founder Asher Low, who himself has recovered from depression, says he relates to what youth are going through: “There are so many youths out https://mymagicmud.com/wp-content/slot-gacor-gampang-menang/ there struggling and they have nowhere to go.”
Based in Singapore, the non-profit reaches out to youth aged 12-25 years experiencing mental health concerns, providing support through therapy, counselling, social activities, and group work.
Asher had started Limitless with some friends and wanted to focus on three areas – poverty, social exclusion and mental health, but soon decided to shift attention to the latter.
“When we opened our doors…we realised that very often if youth come in, even for a social exclusion issue, they get bullied, they have issues with their parents, it’s a BGR (boy-girl relationship) issue, it’s a school issue, underlying all that is a mental health condition.”
Fighting against the lows of depression
One in seven Singaporeans have experienced a mental disorder at some point in their lives, according to a study spearheaded by the Institute of Mental Health.
Depression remains the most common mental disorder, with one in 16 people in Singapore having the condition in their lifetime.