A Chinese teenager appears to have taken his own life after the story of him being sold as an infant by his birth parents and recently reunited with them went viral.
Liu Xuezhou, 17, was found dead early Monday on a beach by local authorities in the city of Sanya, in China's southern Hainan province, according to the Chinese news outlet The Paper.
Liu, a trainee teacher from Shijiazhuang city in the northeastern Hebei province, posted a video in early December appealing for help to find his birth parents, who he said had sold him to his adoptive parents in 2005.
His story quickly went viral and two weeks later he found his birth father, Ding Shuangquan, with the help of police and DNA evidence. The two met on Dec. 26 and two weeks later Liu was reunited with his birth mother, identified only by her surname, Zhang, who lived in a separate location.
Get Boston local news, weather forecasts, lifestyle and entertainment stories to your inbox. Sign up for NBC Boston’s newsletters.
He described both meetings as "happy." But things quickly turned sour.
Read the full story on NBCNews.com
If you or someone you know is at risk of suicide, please call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 800-273-8255, text TALK to 741741 or visit SpeakingOfSuicide.com/resources for additional resources.
