Emma Heming Willis, the wife of Bruce Willis, shared an exclusive first look at her conversation with Cameron Oaks Rogers on the Jan. 28 episode of her podcast, "Conversations with Cam." In the conversation, Emma, 47, gave an update on her husband's ongoing struggle with frontotemporal dementia and revealed that "Bruce never, never tapped in."
"I think that's like the blessing and the curse of this," she said. "He never connected the dots that he had this disease, and I'm really happy about that. I'm really happy that he doesn't know about it."
Bruce, like others with similar conditions, has anosognosia, a condition where "your brain can't recognize one or more other health conditions you have," as explained by the Cleveland Clinic. In Emma's words, "it's where your brain can't identify what is happening to it," so the "Die Hard" actor and others with anosognosia "think this is their normal."
"People think this might be denial, like they don't want to go to the doctor because they're like, 'I'm fine, I'm fine,' but actually, this is the anosognosia that comes into play," Emma said. "It's not denial. It's just that their brain is changing. This is a part of the disease."
The action star's family shared that he had been diagnosed with frontotemporal dementia (FTP) in 2023. It's a catchall term for a group of brain disorders that cause the frontal and temporal lobes of the brain to atrophy, leading to speech issues, emotional problems, and changes in personality. Other symptoms can include loss of motor skills such as problems walking, swallowing, or muscle spasms. It's a progressive disease and the most common form of dementia for people under 60.
As Emma shared, Bruce is "still very much present in his body." She explained that as his dementia has progressed, "we have progressed along with him. We've adapted along with him."
"He has a way of connecting with me and our children that might not be the same as you would connect with your loved one, but it's still very beautiful," she said. "It's still very meaningful. It's just different. You just learn how to adapt."
