Aaron Carter’s Twin Talks Brother's Addiction And 'Toxic' Childhood

Angel Carter, the twin sister of the late Aaron Carter, has reflected on her brother's sudden passing and her family's "painful" past.

While Aaron's spiral was evident in a handful of arrests for driving under the influence and drug possession, his situation worsened when Leslie, his then-25-year-old sister who struggled with mental health issues, died of an overdose in 2012. Five years later in 2017, their father, Robert, suddenly passed away from an apparent heart attack at age 65.

In this week's edition of PEOPLE, Angel recounted how their father's death fast-tracked Aaron's decline into alcohol and drugs. In her words, "I always felt like that was the beginning of the end. Aaron was already in a bad place, but it was like a domino effect."

After the passing of their father, Aaron took the step of admitting himself into a rehabilitation facility, where medical professionals identified schizophrenia and multiple personality disorder in his diagnosis.

Throughout her brother's tumultuous last years, Angel could only watch in distress as he streamed unsettling videos online. These clips depicted him in the presence of firearms and inhaling compressed gas from air canisters while sharing shocking stories about how his family and others allegedly planned to kill him. 

"I just kept waiting for him to snap out of it but he never did. He wanted so badly to be happy. He really fought to the end, but he just had too many problems to be fixed. He'd become this person who we no longer recognized. I don't even think he recognized himself," Angel recalled further.

Months after his death, their mother, Jane Schneck, did the weirdest thing by posting images of her late son's death scene, insisting that he had been receiving death threats. Additionally, she claimed that authorities dismissed her concerns a month before the official ruling, which attributed his death to drowning caused by drug ingestion and gas inhalation.

Delving deeper into their history, Angel — who has since stopped talking to Jane for invading Aaron's privacy like that — shared, "Our childhood was filled with emotional abuse, dysfunction and addiction."

Taking steps to break what she refers to as a "generational" cycle, Angel has joined forces with the children's mental health organization On Our Sleeves. Through the organization, "the stigma surrounding mental health and not being able to talk to children about how they're feeling" will be broken. In her words:

"It's much easier to raise a strong child than to fix a broken adult. Something positive has to come from all this. I refuse to allow Aaron to have died in vain."

The last time Angel spoke so openly about her twin brother was in December 2022 when she expressed her heartache at losing the singer just a month before their 35th birthday. At the time, The Blast reported that she had posted a tribute to Instagram that began:

"I want to start by sharing how much I appreciate all the birthday wishes. While today is incredibly tough, I am overwhelmed by your love and support. Thank you from the bottom of my heart."

The Florida-born star then recalled how she felt "broken and confused" as part of the pain of losing Leslie over ten years ago. Even though the experience made her question her own existence, she re-lived it when Aaron died in November 2022. Reflecting more on the pair's death, the 35-year-old wrote:

"When we lost Leslie, I was blindsided and shocked. With Aaron, however, we had tried everything. In fact, I spoke with him two days before he passed, and I begged, once again, for him to let us help. I did not know that would be the last time that I would ever hear his voice. And now, I sit here on our birthday, trying to navigate this unimaginable loss because of untreated mental illness and the addiction that it led to."

After declaring that the day the "I'm All About You" hitmaker died as the "worst day" of her life Angel continued:

"I have loved him since we were born... it feels like a piece of my soul is gone. And yet, despite all this pain, his passing has lit a fire within me. I feel a calling and responsibility to help other families and continue the conversation to further break the stigmas that surround mental illness."