TOLEDO, Ohio — Family members are pleading for help in finding 25-year-old Xiao Lu, an Ohio National Guardsman who hasn't been seen in days.
The Sylvania man went missing after work on Tuesday.
The family sat down with WTOL 11 Thursday night at their Sylvania home. Lu lives with his parents, two sisters and his extended family. Some of them don't speak English, but you didn't need a translator to hear the desperation in their voices.
His younger sister Grace says he left work at the post office on South St. Clair Street early Tuesday in his 2005 maroon Toyota Avalon. No one has seen or heard from him since.
"We didn't start freaking out until about 10 p.m because he never comes home that late and he always comes home at like 7 p.m. every single day," she said.
When he didn't come home, his sisters remembered some text messages he sent them earlier in the day that they say were out of the ordinary.
"He said stuff like 'I love you' and he never really says that stuff," Grace said. "So we thought it was like really odd."
Lu has been working for the post office almost a year. He's also been with the Ohio National Guard for a few years and it's something those who know him best say he loves. But his family is his true home.
"He's a really good brother," Grace added. "He's one of our biggest inspirations. We always look up to him and he's really nice to us."
"We get along pretty well," Lu's other sister Joyce said. "And since we were kids, he took care of us."
Grace said one of her brother's friends told them Xiao had been depressed lately and they admit he has struggled with his mental health in the past. But she says he has gone through therapy and his family is everything to him.
"He's never done anything like this," she said. "So if they see him, we're all waiting for him to come home and we love him and we miss him."
His mother, speaking in Chinese, cried for anyone with information to come forward. Through a translator, she said: "Anybody who saw this message, saw his car, have any information, just call the Crime Stopper line or 911 to let us know."
His mom added a simple "I love you, son."
The family has posted to Toledo missing persons groups on Facebook and Tik Tok. They are making up flyers and hope someone has information on where he may be and are hoping they hear something soon.