Bruce Willis’ Family Thought His Early Signs of Dementia Were ‘Hollywood Hearing Loss’, Daughter Says: ‘This Is the Beginning of Grief’

variety.com:

Zack Sharf Digital News Director Tallulah Willis, daughter of Bruce Willis and Demi Moore, has penned an emotional essay for Vogue in which she recounts her family coming to terms with Bruce’s dementia.

The actor’s family announced in March 2022 that Willis has aphasia diagnosis, a language disorder caused by brain damage that affects a person’s ability to communicate, and would be retiring from acting as a result.

In February, the family confirmed that Bruce’s aphasia was the result of frontotemporal dementia. Tallulah writes that her family is in the “beginning of grief” due to Bruce’s condition. “I’ve known that something was wrong for a long time,” Tallulah writes. “It started out with a kind of vague unresponsiveness, which the family chalked up to Hollywood hearing loss: ‘Speak up! “Die Hard” messed with Dad’s ears.’ Later that unresponsiveness broadened, and I sometimes took it personally.” Tallulah admits that when she didn’t know her father’s behavior was the early stages of dementia, she thought that he was “losing interest” in her as he got married to Emma Heming Willis and had two new children. “I admit that I have met Bruce’s decline in recent years with a share of avoidance and denial that I’m not proud of [but] the truth is that I was too sick myself to handle it,” she adds, recalling her own struggle with body dysmorphia. “I remember a moment when it hit me painfully: I was at a wedding… and the bride’s father made a moving speech.

Suddenly I realised that I would never get that moment, my dad speaking about me in adulthood at my wedding. It was devastating.” Tallulah later writes that she’s remaining grateful for every moment she gets to spend with Bruce from here on out. “Every time I go to my dad’s