Emma Heming Willis says that she can’t know for certain if her husband, Bruce Willis, is aware of his health condition.
During the emotional conversation on the Today Show, Hemming Willis opened up about the current state of Bruce’s health, telling co-host Hoda Kotb that he may or may not know what’s happening to him. “It’s hard to know,” she said.
“What I’m learning is that dementia is hard. It’s hard on the person diagnosed. It’s also hard on the family. And that is no different for Bruce, or myself, or our girls. When they say that this is a family disease, it really is,” she went on to say.
Willis suffers from a condition called frontotemporal dementia, which is an all-encompassing term for a grouping of brain disorders that affects the frontal and temporal lobes of the brain. Essentially, parts of these lobes atrophy, leading to symptoms such as dementia and loss of motor control.
Early symptoms of the disease include speech issues, emotional problems and changes in personality. Other symptoms can include loss of motor skills including problems walking, swallowing or muscle spasms. In March of 2022, Willis started showing these symptoms, prompting him to step away from acting.
Susan Dickinson, head of the Association for Frontotemporal Degeneration, joined Hemming Willis on the show, and said that with the frontal lobe being so heavily affected by the disease, that any real understanding that there has been a change in them or their health is often the first thing those diagnosed with FTD lose. Hemming Willis went on to say, “The most important thing was to be able, for us, to say what the disease was, explain what it is, because when you know what the disease is from a medical standpoint it sort of all makes sense. It was important that we let [our daughters] know what it is because I don’t want there to be any stigma or shame attached to their dad’s diagnosis or any form of dementia.”