OEF-OIF Marine Veteran Fights to Save Lives

Service and Sacrifice: Marine fights suicide spike
WBIR News
John Becker
October 30, 2014

Retired Marine Stephen Cochran with the service dog he credits to saving his life, Semper.

(Photo: WBIR)

(WBIR) An increasing number of military veterans in Tennessee find they share this fact: they have seen more of their fellow troops die by suicide than in combat.

The Tennessee Department of Veterans Affairs notes the number of suicides among veterans in Tennessee spiked from 197 in 2012, to 214 in 2013. Nationally, the Department of Veterans in its last comprehensive survey in 2013 put the number of suicides among veterans at 22 a day.

"I've been as far as you can go down the suicide line without being able to come back," said former enlisted Marine Stephen Cochran and veteran of tours in both Iraq and Afghanistan.

"I've literally lost more friends to suicide than to combat," he recalled after recounting the day after he spent months at war when he had a gun in his own mouth. He credits his service dog "Semper" for scratching at the door and saving his life that day.
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