Bruce Willis and Demi Moore's youngest daughter Tallulah Willis is opening up for the first time about the health diagnosis she received that has changed her life. Over the weekend, the former actress took to Instagram and posted a throwback video with her father, where she appears hoisted on his hip while he gives an interview on the red carpet.
She captioned the post with: "Tell me [you're] autistic without telling me [you're] autistic," prompting fans to both inquire about the apparent health revelation, and gush about the Die Hard actor's calm and caring demeanor in the clip.
After one of Tallulah's followers wrote: "Not sure how much of your journey you've shared but would love to read more. You're brave and inspiring and this is a very sweet video," she candidly replied with insight into her relatively recent autism diagnosis.
"Actually this is the first time I've ever publicly shared my diagnosis. Found out this summer and it's changed my life," she wrote alongside a sun emoji.
Autism in women
According to UCLA Health, it is a common occurrence for autism to go undiagnosed in women well into adulthood; as with many medical studies and beyond, most autism research relied on male participants and their experiences, leading experts to consider it largely a "male" condition for decades.
Today, boys and men are still four times as likely as girls and women to receive an autism diagnosis, and though most experts now believe as many females as males do have autism, per UCLA: "Recent research shows that nearly 80% of autistic females are undiagnosed as of age 18."
While this is the first time Tallulah publicly shares her autism diagnosis, it's not the first time she has opened up about her struggles with her health. Last year, she spoke candidly about her experiences with both her mental health and her battle with an eating disorder.
Tallulah's past comments on her health
In an as-told-to feature for Vogue, she recalled being 11 years old when she first stumbled upon negative comments about her appearance online, and later aged 20, how details about her first time undergoing psychiatric treatment also made it into the news.
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"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 shared in the May 2023 story.
She went on: "When I was 25, I was admitted to a residential treatment facility in Malibu to address the depression that I had lived with through my adolescence. It was a largely therapeutic experience; for the first time, I grieved the 15-year-old misfit me, the ugly duckling. I was also diagnosed with ADHD and started on stimulant medication, which was transformative," however, she added: "I felt smart for the first time, but I also started to enjoy the appetite-suppressant side effect of the meds."
Tallulah's journey to find stability and answers came just as her dad was also undergoing tests that would eventually determine his frontotemporal dementia (FTD) diagnosis, which his family shared to the public in early 2023, after initially revealing his previous aphasia diagnosis in April of 2022.
In June of 2022, after undergoing treatment at Driftwood Recovery in Texas, Tallulah was also diagnosed with borderline personality disorder, and recalling leaving the facility that October, she lastly told Vogue: "I realized that what I wanted more than harmony with my body was harmony with my family – to no longer worry them, to bring a levity to my sisters and my parents… Recovery is probably lifelong, but I now have the tools to be present in all facets of my life, and especially in my relationship with my dad."
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