Bruce Willis’s wife Emma Heming Willis has said their young children are grieving the Die Hard star as his dementia progresses. The model and influencer, 47, recently moved the 70-year-old actor, who has frontotemporal dementia (FTD), out of their family home after acting as his primary caregiver.
Heming said their children, Mabel Ray, 13, and Evelyn Penn, 11, are doing well “all things considered”, but said they miss their dad so much.
“I think they’re doing well, all things considered but it’s hard,’ Emma toldVogue Australia. “They grieve. They miss their dad so much. He’s missing important milestones, that’s tough for them.”
She said that while their kids are resilient, she doesn’t know if they will ever bounce back, but added: “They’re learning and so am I.”
Willis is now living with a full-time care team in a one-storey home as his condition develops and his needs become more complex and intensive, and Heming recently hit back at trolls who criticised her decision to move the actor out of their family property.
“Too often, caregivers are judged quickly and unfairly by those who haven’t lived this journey or stood on the front lines of it,” she said on Instagram after receiving flak online.
Emma, who described the choice as the “hardest decision”, added that she expected judgement and criticism, but shared the update as “it creates connection and validation for those actually navigating the realities of caregiving every day”.
“That’s who I share for and so I can build a deeper connection with a community that understands this journey,” she said.
Emma added that those who criticise often “don’t have the experience to back it up”, which she said strips their viewpoint of effect.
“The truth is, the opinions are so loud and they’re so noisy, but if they don’t have any experience of this, they don’t get a say.”
According to the NHS, frontotemporal dementia, which Willis was diagnosed with in February 2023, affects behaviour and language, and gets worse over time.
“He would want them to be in a home that was more tailored to their needs, not his needs,” she told Diane Sawyer in the ABC special Emma & Bruce Willis: The Unexpected Journey.
Emma married the Pulp Fiction actor in 2009, and the couple has two daughters, 13-year-old Mabel and 11-year-old Evelyn.
Providing an update on the star’s health, she added: “Bruce is still very mobile. Bruce is in really great health overall. It’s just his brain that is failing him.”
She explained that his language abilities are “going”, but the family have “learned to adapt”.
Willis has maintained a strong relationship with his ex-wife, Demi Moore, with whom he shares three children: Rumer, Scout, and Tallulah. The family have described the condition as a “cruel disease” with no cure.
Earlier this year, Rumer, 37, opened up about the challenges of not being able to converse with her father as she once used to.
In a Father’s Day post, she wrote: “Today is hard, I feel a deep ache in my chest to talk to you and tell you everything I’m doing and what’s going on in my life. To hug you and ask you about life and your stories and struggles and successes.
“I wish I asked you more questions while you could still tell me about it all.”
