Bruce Willis‘ wife is “happy” about one thing when it comes to his frontotemporal (FTP) dementia battle…
In an interview on the Conversations with Cam podcast on Wednesday, Emma Heming opened up about her husband’s devastating diagnosis, saying that “Bruce never, never tapped in.” Basically meaning, the Die Hard actor has no idea he has dementia! Wow!
And you know what? As sad as it may sound, the 47-year-old author is actually glad he “doesn’t know.” She explained:
“I think that’s like the blessing and the curse of this, is that 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.”
Like many others with FTP, Emma revealed Bruce has anosognosia. According to the Cleveland Clinic, that is a condition where “your brain can’t recognize one or more other health conditions you have,” and is “extremely common” with mental health disorders like schizophrenia, Alzheimer’s disease, and dementia.
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In her own words, Emma shared that “it’s where your brain can’t identify what is happening to it.” So, Bruce and others with anosognosia “think this is their normal.” While it is common, Emma made a point to also note that “it’s not for everybody.” She continued:
“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,’ actually, this is the anosognosia that comes into play. It’s not denial. It’s just that their brain is changing. This is a part of the disease.”
The Coco Baba founder added that Bruce is “still very much present in his body.” Although The Sixth Sense star doesn’t know anything about his own health battle, it has been the difficult reality his family has been living with for the past few years. But as his dementia has slowly progressed, she and her loved ones “have progressed along with him,” adding:
“We’ve adapted along with him. He has a way of connecting with me, our children that might not be the same as you would connect with your loved one, but it’s still very beautiful. It’s still very meaningful. It’s just — it’s just different. You just learn how to adapt.”
Emma and her family are simply doing the best they can with everything at the end of the day.
Watch her candid conversation (below):
We continue to send all the love in the world!
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[Image via Conversations With Cam Podcast/YouTube, Derrick Salters/WENN]
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