On October 29, 2019 Carlos Sanchez-Snodgrass invited his grandmother and his mom Melanie to the kitchen for a cup of Coke Cola. He told them he wanted to talk about something important while drinking some soda.
However when Melanie picked up the cup, she looked inside for a second and asked Carlos “What’s in your hand? Did you put anything in there?”
“Nothing,” Carlos replied nervously. “Just drink some Coke.”
Seconds later, he dropped two Mentos inside two Coke Cola liters sitting on the kitchen table and coke shot out from the top and hit the lights above.
Carlos recorded the prank and then put it on online.
“Everyone think it’s hysterical,” Melanie Snodgrass said last Friday during an interview with FOX 17 after re-watching that video with Carlos. “But yeah it was my kitchen and yeah not so much.”
Melanie and Carlos laughed when they watchedit again. Carlos posts all his video on his YouTube channel JustCarlos TV . He created it over a year ago and he’s since gained over 10,000 subscribers.
“It’s crazy to me like it’s shocking because the numbers just go up everyday,” he said. “It means the world to me knowing that people care about me and want to see my content.”
And, some of his most watched videos are the ones where he talks about his battle with leukemia.
“I just have positive attitude,” Carlos said in his video titled ‘I Have Cancer.’ “And we’re just going to fight through it and record my journey.”
Carlos said he was diagnosed with Acute Lymphoblastic (ALL) B-Cell Leukemia on September 9, 2019 right before he began his freshman year at Marshall High School. He thought he had mononucleosis but when he went to Oaklawn Hospital, he underwent a few blood tests. Those tests were sent to Bronson Hospital in Kalamazoo,. Later that day, doctors there told him that he had cancer.
Since then the journey has been hard, he said.
“Chemo is awful,” Carlos said. “The cancer isn’t really what’s bad. It’s the chemotherapy.”
Carlos said he was exhausted all the time and he had an allergic reaction to the medication. However, he decide to be positive and record his journey on his channel.
“Comment #PrayForCarlos. We need to. I need you guys’ support,” he said in the same video. “That’s really why I’m pushing and I’m going to make a wish to see Dwayne Johnson in Hawaii.”
Since his diagnosis, he posted a few videos about his cancer journey. Followers have taken to his vulnerability he said.
“It really just started off ‘cause I wanted to help others going through it,” he said. “When I was at the hospital I saw like babies in there and kids and it made me really sad. But I felt like if I made videos about it maybe it would help them.”
Carlos said cancer patients have reached out to him thanking him for his videos.
He added that the videos have not only helped them but they've been therapeutic for him too. And, his mom Melanie.
“This whole time he’s been really strong and stayed positive when I really questioned whether he was going to be able to handle the treatment,” Melanie said. “We just laughed and joked and had the best time with the nurses and the doctors.”
Thursday, January 2, Carlos found out he was in remission. He and his mom were relieved they said. He hopes now that people, especially cancer patients, will continue to watch his videos for inspiration to push forward.
"If they could just laugh or have fun and see that just because you have cancer doesn’t mean it limits your life," he said.
