Bruce Willis' Daughter Details Her Struggle to Accept His Dementia Diagnosis

Tallulah Willis opened up about learning her father, actor Bruce Willis, had dementia, detailing her struggle to accept his diagnosis while battling her own health issues.

In a deeply personal essay for Vogue published on Wednesday, May 31, the 29-year-old actress and youngest of Bruce's kids with ex-wife Demi Moore described intuitively knowing that "something was wrong for a long time" but ultimately coping with the confirmation in a way that she was "not proud of."

Tallulah began recounting the first symptoms the family noticed but ultimately brushed off as a side effect of working on loud sets. "It started out with a kind of vague unresponsiveness, which the family chalked up to Hollywood hearing loss," she wrote. Later adding that relatives would have to tell Bruce, now 68, to "speak up," not knowing this was one of the early warning signs of the neurological condition.

But when the Die Hard actor's unresponsiveness "broadened," Tallulah said she took it personally.

"He had had two babies with my stepmother, Emma Heming Willis, and I thought he’d lost interest in me," she admitted. "Though this couldn’t have been further from the truth, my adolescent brain tortured itself with some faulty math: I’m not beautiful enough for my mother, I’m not interesting enough for my father."

Tallulah continued, explaining that she avoided and even denied her father's health decline. As the essay continued, Tallulah shared that, at that time, she was struggling with an eating disorder and was too sick to properly receive the news.

"For the last four years, I have suffered from anorexia nervosa, which I’ve been reluctant to talk about because, after getting sober at age 20, restricting food has felt like the last vice that I got to hold on to," she candidly relayed. Five years later, she was admitted to a residential treatment facility for depression, where she said she had "a largely therapeutic experience," and was diagnosed with ADHD.

"While I was wrapped up in my body dysmorphia, flaunting it on Instagram, my dad was quietly struggling," she reflected. "All kinds of cognitive testing was being conducted, but we didn’t have an acronym yet. I had managed to give my central dad-feeling canal an epidural; the good feelings weren’t really there, the bad feelings weren’t really there."

She recalled the heartache of attending a friend's wedding and seeing the bride's father make a speech, adding, "Suddenly I realized that I would never get that moment, my dad speaking about me in adulthood at my wedding. It was devastating. I left the dinner table, stepped outside, and wept in the bushes. And yet I remained focused on my body."

But everything changed last spring, after being dumped by her then-fiancé, her family stepped in and sent her back to a recovery program, where she's since been re-diagnosed and set up with the proper tools to cope.

Now, she's focused on spending all the time she can with Bruce–and her newborn niece via sister Rumer–taking lots of photos. "I can bring him an energy that’s bright and sunny, no matter where I’ve been. In the past I was so afraid of being destroyed by sadness, but finally I feel that I can show up and be relied upon," she said. "I can savor that time, hold my dad’s hand, and feel that it’s wonderful."

Tallulah concluded, "It feels like a unique and special time in my family, and I’m just so glad to be here for it."

If you or someone you know is suffering from a mental health crisis and need help immediately, call 988 or contact the Crisis Text Line by texting “NEDA” to 741741 to be connected with a trained volunteer at Crisis Text Line. Crisis Text Line is a separate organization staffed by volunteers who provide free, 24/7 support via text message to individuals struggling with mental health, including eating disorders, and experiencing crisis situations.