Bruce Willis’ wife Emma reveals how she copes with ‘paralysing grief’ amid husband’s aphasia

Bruce Willis’ wife Emma Heming Willis revealed how she’s been coping with her “paralysing” feelings of “grief in the wake of her husband’s aphasia diagnosis in March.

The 44-year-old model shared a video of herself taking on different hobbies on Instagram on Tuesday, in honour of National Grief Awareness day. In the clip, Heming Willis is seen working out, gardening, painting a fence, and playing tennis. A snippet of the video also showed her with her and Willis’ daughters, Mabel and Evelyn.

In the caption of her post, she wrote: “This was the summer of self discovery—finding new hobbies, going out of my comfort zone and staying active. My grief can be paralysing but I’m learning how to live along side it.”

Heming Willis also highlighted a lesson that she learned about grief from her 31-year-old stepdaughter, Scout, whom the Die Hard actor shares with his ex-wife, Demi Moore.

“As my step-daughter @scoutlaruewillis told me, grief is the deepest and purest form of love. I hope you find some comfort in that too,” she concluded.

This isn’t the first time that Heming Willis has been candid about her mental health throughout Bruce Willis’s aphasia, a brain condition that can impact a person’s ability to communicate. In an interview with The Bump in May, Heming Willis confessed how putting her family first was taking a “toll” on her health.

“I put my family’s needs above my own, which I found does not make me any kind of hero,” she said. “That amount of care for everyone else within my household had taken a toll on my mental health and overall health, and it served no one in my family.”

However, the model also acknowledged how important it has been to make more time for herself and find things that make her “feel good”.

“I don’t mother myself perfectly but I know that I have some basic baseline needs that are a must, like first and foremost, exercise. I think it’s important to find that one thing that makes you feel good and build from there,” she added.

In March, Bruce Willis and his family announced that the actor was “stepping away” from his career after being diagnosed with aphasia. In a statement shared to Instagram at the time, they wrote: “To Bruce’s amazing supporters, as a family we wanted to share that our beloved Bruce has been experiencing some health issues and has recently been diagnosed with aphasia, which is impacting his cognitive abilities.”

“This is a really challenging time for our family and we are so appreciative of your continued love, compassion and support,” the statement continued. “We are moving through this as a strong family unit, and wanted to bring his fans in because we know how much he means to you, as you do to him.”