Issue date: 11/8/07 Section: News

Media Credit: Associated Press Photo A person identified by U.S. military personnel as ABC anchorman Bob Woodruff is carried on a stretcher from a bus to a C-17 Globemaster medical evacuation plane at Ramstein airbase, southern Germany, in this Jan. 31 file photo.

DETROIT (AP) - Bob Woodruff struggles to talk about his work in raising awareness of traumatic brain injuries.

"Some of it is ... is ..." Woodruff says and stops.

Woodruff suffered a traumatic brain injury on Jan. 29, 2006, when a roadside bomb exploded in Iraq, where he was doing reports for ABC News.

Traumatic brain injury has been called the signature wound of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Thousands of troops have suffered mild or moderate Traumatic brain injury with symptoms that include headaches, dizziness, memory loss, vision problems and irritability.

Others have suffered severe brain injuries - their memory is shattered and they cannot walk, talk or feed themselves.

Woodruff, 46, considers himself a lucky one, even though he struggles to remember words and names. Some of it is ... is ... Woodruff's thoughts go racing down a mental highway, searching for a way to express himself because it's out there, that perfect word, at the end of the road, stuck deep in his vocabulary.

He knows the word. He can feel it. But he can not reach it.

He can not quite bring himself to say it.

It is like the mental highway is cut in half - unseen roadwork, up ahead - creating a traffic jam.

It can be maddening and frustrating, as this silent drama plays out in his head, if only for a microsecond, countless times every day, for a man who was once so eloquent and smooth.

Some of it is ... is ... "opening up awakeness," he says and stops. No, that is the wrong word.

Back on that mental highway. Time for a trick.

He takes an exit around the problem. Down a back road. Around the problem and ends up in another place, coming up with another word. A synonym; thank God for synonyms.

Some of it is ... is ... "ah, awareness of Traumatic brain injury generally, not only to general citizens of the country, but also to Congress and the Senate," he says.

Awareness. Maybe it is not the perfect word. But it works, for now - he can finish his sentence - and that's an improvement. There was a time when none of the words would come to him.

"I've learned to fake it," Woodruff says.

But he can not fake it well enough to return to ABC's anchor chair, at least not yet.

Woodruff's ability to speak is his job.

"You can't cover the presidential race," Woodruff says, "and forget the name of the candidate."

From a distance, he's still Bob Woodruff - our Bob. From Bloomfield Township, Mich. Smart. Handsome. Poised. Born to be a star. The guy who left Detroit and went on to ABC News and took over as anchor. "It lasted a full 27 days," Woodruff says.

But his face is marked with scars and he tires easily.

Woodruff, who was once the face of ABC News, is now the face of Traumatic brain injury.

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