Carolina Strong: Mentor program forges lifelong friendships. ‘He made me realize it gets better.’

Spend even a little time with Tony McKinney and Lamar Patterson, and you get the feeling they were destined to be friends. It just took a mentorship program to bring them together.

Big Brothers Big Sisters of Central Carolinas brought the friends together, but their hardships connected them and their joy for life keeps them together.

Lamar was paired with Tony as his big brother three years ago, a couple of years after Tony started to lose his vision.

Tony was in sixth grade when he was diagnosed with glaucoma.

“That was a really hard time for me. I felt really alone and needed someone to talk to and stuff,” Tony said.

Lamar was looking for a volunteer opportunity after his own health struggles as a kid and the destructive path that followed. He spent so much time in the hospital he had to fail 10th grade.

“I did not want somebody else, even if they did not go through the same thing as me, but just going through something -- I didn’t want them to be alone, to feel left alone,” Lamar explained.

They’ve gotten to know each other over meals, games, movies, and time outdoors. Lamar has helped Tony - now a high school senior- come out of his shell and navigate the tricky teenage years.

“He’s made me realize that like it, it gets better kind of, you know, like, it gets better. And you can inspire other people like, through your struggles,” Tony said.

Tony is set to graduate next winter, and he plans to go into the music business. That doesn’t mean he’ll leave his friend., who he now has a strong bond with.

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“One of the things about him, it’s very contagious - it’s his laughter,” Lamar said. Every time we get together, I always look forward to it.”

The pair told Channel 9′s Elsa Gillis they’ll be friends for a really long time.

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