DAYTON — The Centers for Disease Control said two people died by suicide every 30 minutes: that’s one suicide every 11 minutes.
Every year, more than 49,000 people die by suicide, and that doubles the homicides in the United States.
For decades, viewers in Dayton watched reporter Jim Bucher on TV, but he hid his deepest, darkest secrets.
He first tried killing himself when he was 5 years old. Then, last fall, he tried for a fourth time, when he walked in front of a semi.
[DOWNLOAD: Free WHIO-TV News app for alerts as news breaks]
Bucher hopes his story encourages others to get help. He has been in a south Montgomery County nursing home since last fall.
“I just woke up one morning, saying I’ve got to end this. I’m over it. Finances, marriage, kids, it just was all coming down on me,” Bucher said.
On April 13, 2024, at 6:01 a.m., at the railroad crossing on Leo Street in Dayton, “I pulled my car in front of a train and tried to kill myself,” he said.
Bucher said he would have succeeded had the train hit his Jeep just a couple of inches more to the right.
“I’m just wallowing away, feeling sorry for myself,” he said. News Center 7’s James Brown talked to Bucher, and he said his mental health and thoughts of suicide go as far back as when he was 5 years old at school recess.
“I threw myself off the top of the slide, and it cracked my head.” Then, when he was a teenager, “I did it again with my mom. My mom was in the car. We were driving somewhere, and I opened the passenger door,” Bucher said.
But Bucher said his parents never talked about his mental struggles.
In 1983, he got his big break when Bucher was hired at WDTN, Channel 2. He loved his job. Loved making people laugh, but in his head, the demons kept getting louder.
“Hydrocodone, Vicodin, Percocet, I mean, I was taking it all, man, taking it all, and in large amounts, for months, if not years. I was high all the time,” Bucher said.
“I was speaking at groups. It’s just the way I had to, I thought I had Cope. Was high on Vicodin,” Bucher said.
For 25 years, Bucher said he took 15-20 pills a day. He said his TV job was to make people laugh.
“I thought if I take Vicodin, I’m going to be funnier. It’s going to multiply the high, and it’s going to multiply my humor, and so that was a big deal,” he said.
When Bucher’s job ended at WDTN in 2012, he said his financial and personal problems worsened.
Over the course of the last five years or so, three different times, he checked himself into behavioral health facilities, hoping that would help silence the demons.
Then, on September 28, 2025, just before 10 am, he stopped his car along Interstate 70 in Englewood, got out, and said, “Here we go.”
“I walked in front of a semi-truck going about 65 miles per hour,” he said.
Bucher said the semi threw him more than 50 feet.
“God was there at that particular moment and saved me. I mean, He did, both times, both times, buddy,” Bucher remembers.
For months, while doctors worked to save his shattered left arm, leg, and ribs, Bucher struggled with understanding his purpose.
“I still ask myself that question. It’s not as obvious, James, as it was early on, but I still asked myself, ‘why am I here,’” he said.
Bucher’s tasks these days are relearning simple things that he took for granted.
“I’m here to help people out there watching that may have watched me over the years and say, you know what? He went through this; I’m going through this. Let me try to get my life together, and hopefully that will happen,” Bucher said.
No more thinking about life’s dead-end road for Jim. His new road, his new journey, and this message for anyone contemplating suicide.
“And, if we get one person off that bridge, man, we’ve done what we’re here for,” he said. “It isn’t worth it. There’s people who love you.”
Officials say suicide is the second leading cause of death among people between the ages of 10 and 34. It’s the fourth leading cause of death for people between the ages of 35 and 44.
In 2024, the suicide rate in Ohio was higher than the national average.
If you or someone you know is struggling with mental health, call or text 988, which is the suicide crisis lifeline. Counselors are available 24 hours a day, 7days a week.
[SIGN UP: WHIO-TV Daily Headlines Newsletter]
