Priya Balagopal: 'She provided so much strength to me'
Priya Balagopal was a loyal friend.
“Even as she was facing some of the hardest times of her life, all she cared about was making other’s people’s lives easier,” her friend Anita Simha said.
While being warm and welcoming to new members of the dance team she co-captained, Bhangra Elite, she helped people through their own struggles.
“She provided so much strength to me. She had this crazy, huge, white smile and super loud laugh. She was just such a light, and she really just lit up the room,” her friend Rupali Srivastava said.
Her bright and big smile made people’s days and made them feel comfortable.
“Even as she was struggling, she made a choice to brighten other’s days,” Simha said.
She had a voice.
“She never hesitated to stand up for something. It didn’t matter to her what others thought about her,” her friend Raj Shah said.
Her sister, Shalini Balagopal, said she wasn’t afraid to tell people if they were wrong or if she disagreed.
“She wasn’t afraid to say anything. She wasn’t a beat around the bush kind of person. She didn’t bullshit people at all,” Shalini said.
As a feminist and an activist, she stood up for what she believed in, even calling out dance captains for excluding girls by yelling, “Hey guys!”
If her sister was having a bad day or a rough time, she was there with a supportive text telling her to forget the people who weren’t important.
She had her own struggles.
Priya, who graduated from UNC in May 2014, dealt with depression and anxiety for a large part of her life.
On Dec. 10, Priya started a GoFundMe page where she explained her struggle and her strong belief that people should not ignore mental health issues.
“You can tell someone you love that you care about them today. You can encourage your friends to talk about their mental health. You can offer to provide a listening ear to someone you know who is struggling, or sign up to volunteer for a crisis hotline,” Priya wrote on her page.
Priya had told her sister her depression made it exhausting for her to stay positive all the time.
She was suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder and had had previous suicide attempts. At the end of this past weekend, Priya, 24, died by suicide, Shalini said.
She was an activist.
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Her own struggles pushed her to fight to help others in their struggles with mental health.
“She was very passionate about spreading awareness and starting conversations about these sort of things. That was definitely what was special to her,” her sister said.
She participated in the Courage Project and Active Minds at UNC and AmeriCorps after she graduated.
“What I will remember the most about Priya was her sense of assertive compassion and resiliency. She constantly advocated that everyone’s voice was being heard and was very sensitive to others feelings and possible discomfort,” her friend Benjamin Ruiz said in a Facebook message.
Simha said Priya volunteered at the Orange County Rape Crisis Center and a suicide hotline to help others dealing with similar issues.
“In everything that she did and even in her passing, she really just wanted people to be more aware and to be more honest with each other and to really understand people who really suffer from something like this,” Shah said.
She was a fighter.
Her friends said she was a genuine and honest person who didn’t hesitate to say how she felt.
Priya’s mental health issues didn’t stop her from making friends and joining groups.
She had an impact on everyone she met.
“I think everybody would agree, none of us have known anyone even close to being similar to her. She was very unique in everything that she did. I think she had a different individual impact on every individual she met,” Shah said.
After her graduation in 2014, she continued to work with Active Minds and post articles on Facebook trying to raise awareness for depression and other mental health issues.
Priya’s life was fraught with struggles, but the people who cared about her knew her to be someone who dedicated herself to making the world better for other people.
“I think if you ask anyone that knew Priya what was most important to her, they would say dance and justice and maybe pancakes,” Simha said.
