Bruce Willis' wife Emma Heming Willis opened up about her "unconditional love" for the actor as he battles frontotemporal dementia.
On , the 46-year-old model shared an emotional post on Instagram to mark the couple's 17th anniversary. The post featured a throwback photo of Willis, 61, and Emma beaming and holding each other as they posed while standing in the ocean as the sun set behind them. The image that she shared was taken at Parrot Cay in the Turks and Caicos Islands, where the pair tied the knot in 2009.
"17 years of us," Emma began her caption, adding a red heart emoji. "Anniversaries used to bring excitement — now, if I’m honest, they stir up all the feelings, leaving a heaviness in my heart and a pit in my stomach."
She continued, "I give myself 30 minutes to sit in the ‘why him, why us,’ to feel the anger and grief. Then I shake it off and return to what is. And what is… is unconditional love. I feel blessed to know it, and it’s because of him. I’d do it all over again and again in a heartbeat."
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In March 2022, Willis stepped away from Hollywood after being diagnosed with aphasia. His family announced in February 2023 that the actor's aphasia had progressed to frontotemporal dementia.
The "Die Hard" star and Emma first met in 2007 and went public with their romance in January 2008 when the "Perfect Stranger" actress accompanied Willis to the premiere of his movie "What Just Happened?" at the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah.
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In a December 2022 Instagram post, Emma shared a throwback video in which she and Willis were seen having fun in the snow during a winter vacation.
"It was that winter, 15 years ago I fell head [over] heels in love with him #loveofmylife," Emma wrote in the caption.
In a December 2020 interview with People magazine, the pair reminisced about their first meeting.
"When we first met, I was surprised at how charming and how funny he was – and extremely handsome," the former Victoria's Secret angel said. "That was my first thought of you."
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"I was already in love with her," "The Sixth Sense" actor said.
They tied the knot on March 21, 2009 at their home in Turks and Caicos and married again six days later in Beverly Hills. The couple welcomed daughter Mabel in 2012 and daughter Evelyn in 2014.
On Dec. 22, Emma shared a glimpse into Willis' life as a family man ahead of the holidays.
In a series of Instagram stories, Emma posted family photos of Willis spending time with Mabel and Evelyn.
Among the images was a black and white picture of Heming and Willis with their daughters, which she captioned, "Them. Always." In the photo, the couple are smiling as they lovingly look each other in the eyes, with Mabel and Evelyn sitting on their laps.
In addition to his two children with Heming, Willis also shares three adult daughters, Rumer, 36, Scout, 33, and Tallulah, 30, with his ex-wife, Demi Moore. The former couple finalized their divorce in 2000. They have remained close friends and co-parents.
The blended family has celebrated holidays and vacationed together. Moore, Emma and their daughters with Willis have also put on a united front regarding Willis' dementia battle.
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In an interview with Town & Country in October, Heming shared that the early symptoms of his dementia were dismissed since he struggled with stuttering as a child.
"He had a severe stutter as a child," she explained. "Bruce has always had a stutter, but he has been good at covering it up. As his language started changing, it [seemed like it] was just a part of a stutter, it was just Bruce."
According to the National Institute on Aging, frontotemporal dementia occurs as a "result of damage to neurons in the frontal and temporal lobes of the brain," and the symptoms include "unusual behaviors, emotional problems, trouble communicating, difficulty with work, or difficulty with walking."
At the 2024 Hamptons International Film Festival, Moore addressed her ex-husband's health struggles.
"You know, I've said this before. The disease is what the disease is," "The Substance" star told the crowd while accepting the career achievement in acting award, according to People magazine. "And I think you have to be in real deep acceptance of what that is. But for where he's at, he is stable."
She also shared insight into how she and the rest of the family have learned to work with his diagnosis in their interactions with him, explaining you have "to just meet them where they're at," because "when you're holding on to what was, I think it's a losing game."
