Bruce Willis’ wife has spoken about the first thing she noticed that indicated her husband was suffering from frontotemporal dementia (FTD).
The 69-year-old’s diagnosis was revealed to the world in February 2023 when his family released a statement on social media, after he was diagnosed with Aphasia the year prior.
It was announced in the back-end of 2023 that Willis was not ‘totally verbal’ anymore according to a friend, as his children have provided his fans with updates since then.
The Hollywood legend retired from acting in 2022 after his first diagnosis, with the likes of ex-wife Demi Moore and current wife Emma Heming Willis also sharing his health progress.
Willis’ deteriorating health was easy to spot after noticing one detail (Theo Wargo/Getty Images for Film at Lincoln Center)
Emma shared that the family didn’t initially think much was wrong, but there was one thing that started to change as time went on.
The 46-year-old said that it all began when ‘his language started changing’.
She told Town & Country: “For Bruce, it started with language. He had a severe stutter as a child. He went to college, and there was a theatre teacher who said, ‘I’ve got something that’s going to help you’.
“From that class, Bruce realised that he could memorise a script and be able to say it without stuttering. That’s what propelled him into acting,” she revealed.
However, she explained that Willis ‘always had a stutter’, even in his prime, but he was ‘good at covering it up’.
Even then, she didn’t think it was anything serious, adding: “As his language started changing, it (seemed like it) was just a part of a stutter, it was just Bruce. Never in a million years would I think it would be a form of dementia for someone so young.”
At that point, it would still be a few years until he was diagnosed with FTD, as his wife said it had been ‘misdiagnosed, misunderstood or missed’ several times.
His family didn’t suspect much was wrong until his speech started changing (Jim Spellman/WireImage)
The model and Die Hard actor have two children together in Mabel, 12 and Evelyn, 10, who also noticed their father’s health decline before being diagnosed.
They have ‘plans to do and experience beautiful things with their girls’ despite his health, with Emma adding that she has seen some ‘cracks of light’ in the situation.
Bruce has three daughters with former wife Demi Moore, Rumer, 36, Scout 33, and Tallulah, 30.
The latter has spoken about her father’s condition on several occasions, most recently on Instagram, when addressing a troll.
There are currently no treatments or known cures for FTD.
