Woodruff story inspires while it informs

Sun., March 18, 2007

Carole Goldberg The Spokesman-Review

“In an Instant: A Family Journey of Love and Healing”

by Lee Woodruff and Bob Woodruff (Random House, 304 pages, $25.95)

Journalists are often told: Report the news; don’t make the news.

Try telling that to Bob Woodruff.

Named “ABC World News Tonight” co-anchor in December 2005, Woodruff was nearly killed by a roadside bomb the next month in Iraq, while he was reporting on Iraqi and U.S. security forces with photographer Doug Vogt, who also was seriously hurt.

Woodruff suffered a severe head injury and had to endure a medically induced coma, skull reconstruction and a long and difficult rehabilitation.

His story of resilience and courage is told in “In an Instant: A Family Journey of Love and Healing,” co-written with his wife, Lee Woodruff, a public-relations executive and freelance writer.

It also is the story of their courtship, marriage, travels and family life with their four children. It describes the feelings and experiences that brought them together and gave them the strength to face and overcome the challenges that began the instant that bomb went off.

Lee relates a moment of despair when she cried out in anger:

“I made him promise me when David Bloom died (in Iraq) that he would never do that to us. And he lied to me. How can I ever trust anything or anyone again?”

Bob’s doctor replies:

“I’ve never seen one family yet who didn’t rise to the occasion. … You, Bob and the children will be connected in ways you cannot know now.”

This story of love, survival and inspiration shows how true his words were.

Local journalism is essential.

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