Demi Moore has opened up about the difficult experience of watching her ex-husband Bruce Willis’ decline following his dementia diagnosis but had high praise for his second wife, Emma Heming Willis, who has become an author and advocate for caregivers. However, she’s now facing some backlash after revealing she placed the Hollywood superstar in a separate home.
“I have so much compassion for Emma in this, being a young woman,” Moore said of Hemming Willis in a pre-taped interview played on an episode of The Oprah Podcast that centered on an interview with Hemming Willis. “There’s no way that anybody could have anticipated where this was going to go. And I really think she’s done a masterful job. She has been so dedicated to forging the right path. She’s had equal amounts of fear and strength and courage in navigating this.”
Heming Willis and her family have been relatively quiet after they announced in 2023 that the Die Hard and Pulp Fiction actor has frontotemporal dementia and lost his ability to speak; a year prior, he had retired from acting after announcing his aphasia diagnosis. Last week, however, Herring Willis appeared in a special report with legendary ABC News reporter Diane Sawyer in which she opened up about the pain and strength the family has experienced since the sudden diagnosis turned their lives upside down. The model-turned-advocate also revealed to Sawyer that she placed Willis in a separate home from her and their daughters, which she characterised as a difficult decision but one he would want her to make.
“He would want them to be in a home that was more tailored to their needs, not his needs,” Heming told Sawyer on Emma and Bruce Willis: The Unexpected Journey – A Diane Sawyer Special. Willis shares meals daily with his wife and their daughters in his home, where he lives with the assistance of a full-time care team.
Willis was married to Moore for 13 years; the couple had three daughters together. Nearly a decade after their 2000 divorce, he married Heming, a successful runway, fashion cover girl and entrepreneur, at a ceremony in Turks and Caicos in 2009. The couple has two daughters together and has launched businesses and fragrance lines. Moore spoke of Hemming Willis’ incredible caregiver work while appearing as a guest on The Oprah Podcast on Tuesday.
While speaking in a previously taped interview with host Oprah Winfrey, the recent Oscar-nominated actress for the body horror thriller The Substance spoke on the amount of pressure and work that fell to Hemming Willis once the star was diagnosed, and how she was able to figure it all out, ensure that the father of five had the proper care, and even become an advocate and write a book on caregiving, which comes out this week.
“[Hemming Willis can see] the importance for caregivers and that they have to take care of themselves. If they don’t put that time into making sure that they’re OK, then they can’t show up for anyone else,” Moore added.
Since their divorce, Willis and Moore have been successful co-parents and have remained friends. Moore attended his second wedding, and the action star developed a friendship with Ashton Kutcher, who was Moore’s partner for several years after their split. But Moore admitted to Winfrey that watching Willis’ decline has been tough on her.
“It’s hard to see somebody who was so vibrant and strong and so direct shift into this other part of themselves,” Moore told Winfrey. “But my particular perspective is, one, I really always say it’s so important just to meet them where they’re at. Don’t have an expectation of them needing to be who they were or who you want them to be. And when you do that I find that there is an incredible sweetness and something that’s soft and tender and loving. Perhaps it is more playful and childlike in a certain sense because of how much more caretaking they need.”
While speaking with Sawyer, Hemming Willis updates the newswoman on the former actor’s condition, saying, “Bruce is in really great health, overall, it’s just his brain that is failing him.”
But the revelation that she and Bruce Willis do not live in the same home brought some backlash across the internet — the mother of two took to Instagram to address this, saying that she had expected to hear some opinions in the comments section.
Too often, caregivers are judged quickly and unfairly by those who haven’t lived this journey or stood on the front lines of it,” she wrote to her followers. “Sharing openly may invite opinions, but more importantly, it creates connection and validation for those actually navigating the realities of caregiving every day. That’s who I share for and so I can build a deeper connection with a community that understands this journey.”
