Bruce Willis' Wife Explains Why His Early Dementia Symptoms Were Completely Ignored

Bruce Willis early frontotemporal dementia (FTD) symptoms were difficult to detect for a pretty understandable reason.

His wife, Emma Heming Willis , explained to journalist Katie Couric in an interview for Town & Country  published Tuesday that the Die Hard star had a condition since childhood that masked one of her husbands most pronounced early warning signs. 

For Bruce, it started with language. He had a severe stutter as a child, Emma Willis told Couric.

The former model said that his stutter was what propelled him into acting in the first place.

He went to college, and there was a theater teacher who said, Ive got something thats going to help you. From that class, Bruce realized that he could memorize a script and be able to say it without stuttering. 

Emma Willis went on to say that the actor 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, Emma Willis explained. Never in a million years would I think it would be a form of dementia for someone so young.

The Pulp Fiction stars family publicly announced his diagnosis last year.

Unfortunately, challenges with communication are just one symptom of the disease Bruce faces. While this is painful, it is a relief to finally have a clear diagnosis, read the statement shared by his ex-wife, Demi Moore, and posted on a website for The Association for Frontotemporal Degeneration.

Emma Willis told Couric that finally figuring out what was happening to her husband was key when it came to helping him and explaining his FTD diagnosis to the couples two daughters Mabel Ray, 12, and Evelyn Penn, 10.

This disease is misdiagnosed, its missed, its misunderstood, so finally getting to a diagnosis was key so that I could learn what frontotemporal dementia is and I could educate our children, Emma Willis said. Ive never tried to sugarcoat anything for them. Theyve grown up with Bruce declining over the years. Im not trying to shield them from it.

Moore, who was married to Bruce Willis from 1987 to 2000 and shares three adult children with him Rumer, Scout and Tallulah seemed to echo Emma Willis sentiment  of acceptance earlier this month.

You know, Ive said this before. The disease is what the disease is, Moore told the audience while accepting an award at Hamptons International Film Festival, People reported . And I think you have to be in real deep acceptance of what that is. 

The Ghost alum added: But for where hes at, he is stable.

Despite Emma Willis experiencing grief and sadness due to her husbands diagnosis, she also let Bruce Willis concerned fans know in March via Instagram that just because the Moonlighting alum has a neurodegenerative condition, theres still plenty of love  and joy in their household. 

Stop scaring people to think that once they get a diagnosis of some kind of neurocognitive disease that Thats it. Its over. Lets pack it up. Nothing else to see here, were done. No. It is the complete opposite of that, OK? Emma Willis said in a video posted to her account.