'Suicidal' Student's One-Way Ticket to Japan

April 16, 2008— -- The family of a troubled American student who purchased a one-way ticket to Japan perhaps with suicidal intentions pleaded with the local media today for help finding the young woman.

"We are very worried about what she will do when her money runs out," Susan Budnick, mother of 21-year-old Skye Lynn Budnick, said at a press conference in Sapporo, the main city on Japan's northernmost main island, Hokkaido.

Budnick's family members say the junior at Central Connecticut State University and native of Southington, Conn., left the United States on April 1 without telling her family members she was going to Japan. On April 4, her family looked at Budnick's e-mail account and discovered that she had booked the one-way trip to Hokkaido by way of Tokyo.

Skye's sister, Megan Budnick, who appeared at the press conference with her mother in Japan, posted a blog about her sister's disappearance at 4:30 p.m. on April 4 to a profile on MTV Think, an online community tied to the music television network.

In the post, Megan, who is in Japan and did not respond to an e-mail from ABC News, described her sister as someone who "loves everything" about the Asian country but has been coping with depression.

"She never told any friends or family about this trip, but she has been very depressed, and has always said that she wanted to leave to go to Japan and just kill herself there," Megan wrote in the post.

The itinerary discovered by Budnick's family described a passage from the United States through Tokyo to Hokkaido. "She doesn't have a cell phone, she didn't pack any belongings," Megan wrote, adding that the only item missing was her sister's laptop.

The missing woman's family also found a suicide note saved in draft form in her e-mail account that was prepared for a friend, according to Megan Budnick.

A missing person's report has been filed with Japanese authorities, but because Skye Budnick is an adult, there is little that can be done by authorities, according to her sister.