As seen in the St. Paul Pioneer Press on November 7, 2010.

Bob Woodruff’s future was brilliant in 2006. The ABC News journalist, father of four and husband to Lee, secured the coveted World News Tonight co-anchor chair after Peter Jennings died. Then fate intervened. Embedded with an Iraqi army unit, Bob was struck by a roadside bomb filled with rocks. He sustained a severe head wound that should have killed him. Amazingly, after lying comatose for 36 days, he not only recovered, he returned to work, but not to the anchor chair.

Lee and their children were at Disney World when Bob was injured. He had originally planned to be there with them, but instead went to Iraq to broadcast on the eve of President Bush’s State of the Union address. While Lee rode Disney’s “Tower of Terror” with their children, Bob surveyed what seemed to be improved conditions in Iraq. After the roadside bomb struck, the Woodruffs faced the prospect that the man who thrived on reporting breaking news had a traumatic brain injury from which he could either die or be permanently debilitated.

A seasoned journaler, Lee chronicled her way through Bob’s recovery. Initially intended as a therapeutic exercise, her writing morphed into a book she co-authored with Bob. Published in 2007, “In An Instant” reveals how they dealt with the trauma of Bob’s injury while struggling to keep their family intact. This year, Lee published a collection of personal essays entitled “Perfectly Imperfect.” She dedicated it to her children, who she said taught her in various ways to slow down, observe the little moments and to laugh at herself, and to Bob, who showed her that anything is possible.

She elaborated on those lessons in a speech last month at the University of Minnesota, where she entertained Minnesota Medical Foundation doctors and donors with her charm, candor and insight. Like many who survive tragedy, Lee became reflective about life. She now looks at time differently, noting that studies show our brains spend mere seconds in the present. We tend to scroll ahead to thoughts of work deadlines and dinner plans instead of focusing on what is happening in the moment, she observed. The key to life is to take those mere seconds and stretch them, to make time for the important things we too readily overlook. Moreover, ignore the dinner dishes and put your arms around the people you love, for in the end, that is what matters most.

Acknowledging we will all suffer in life, Lee observed, “Sorrow is sorrow and fear is fear and loss is loss and we humans are all traveling on the same bandwidth of life.” Confronted with the impossible task of caring for both Bob and her children, she adopted the mantra, “I am one mommy and I am doing the best I can.” She relied upon a large support network, which included her close friend Melanie Bloom, whose husband David (an Edina native) had died while reporting from Iraq. Melanie provided the intuitive support of one who has traveled a similar path. As she and Bob had always done, Lee also wrapped herself in a cloak of humor, bordering on irreverence. With a twinkle in her eye, she observed, “I am the only wife in Westchester County, New York, who can truly say that her husband has rocks in his head.”

The Woodruff family’s story is raw and wrenching, but has an enviable outcome, for few who sustain an injury as severe as Bob’s recover as he did. Injured on a military mission, Bob was treated by military medical personnel at their facilities. The Woodruffs found themselves on the perimeter of a close-knit community to which they did not belong, but to which they are indebted. They developed a kinship and appreciation for men and women who, while serving our country, also received traumatic brain injuries. To provide ongoing support, Bob and Lee started the Bob Woodruff Family Fund (http://remind.org). As life marches on for the Woodruffs, they are paying it forward.

Bob and Lee dealt with dozens of medical professionals and discovered some communicate better than others. Speaking to a group of prominent academics and physicians at the University, Lee offered them a lesson. One of the greatest things that Bob’s nurses did, she said, was to dispense hope by sharing success stories of other patients. About hearing from doctors early on about all the potential risks and outcomes, she asked, “If you beat the hope out of them at the outset, how can a family be expected to move forward?” Encouraging physicians to remember the caregivers and family members when they deliver difficult news, she pointed out, “What an amazing thing it is to find a man with great hands and a bedside manner.”

I was privileged to meet Lee that night. It was chilly outside, drizzling intermittently, and I was feeling a bit blue. As we spoke, the parallels in our lives revealed themselves – writer, mother of four, (one with special needs), hard-working husband who was away more than home, family upended by a horrific event. While I was eager to hear her story, I was mindful that while she nearly lost her husband, I did lose mine. Yet, when we parted, I wished she lived closer, for there is a bond one experiences with another who survives the unimaginable. Lee’s laugh, her clever use of language and her upbeat view have lingered in my mind and psyche. I feel as if I’ve been given a gift in a little blue box that I will unwrap whenever I need a reminder that it’s easier to survive the tough stuff by balancing heavy with light. The box houses the lesson I most appreciated from Lee — because it’s the one that often plagues me – “How do you get through life without humor?”