Robin Williams suffered from Lewy body dementia, and struggled with his mental state
Robin Williams' makeup artist, Cheri Minns, has opened up about the star's heartbreaking final weeks before his tragic suicide in 2014. In a new biography on the actor by writer, Dave Itzkoff, Cheri spoke about Robin's struggle both mentally and physically after being diagnosed with Parkinson's disease, which was actually a misdiagnosis for Lewy body dementia. She explained: "He wasn't in good shape at all. He was sobbing in my arms at the end of every day. It was horrible. Horrible. But I just didn't know."
Robin's makeup artist spoke about his final weeks
Cheri revealed that she suggested Robin return to stand-up to lift his spirits. "I said, 'Robin, why don't you go and do stand-up?'," she said. "He just cried and said, 'I can't, Cheri.' I said, 'What do you mean, you can't?' He said, 'I don't know how anymore. I don't know how to be funny.' And it was just gut-wrenching to hear him admit that, rather than lie to me and say something else. I think that's how troubled he was about all of it."
Robin's son, Zack, his wife, Susan Schneider, and friend, actor Billy Crystal, also spoke about his final weeks in the biography, but it isn't the first time Susan has opened up about his tragic death aged just 63. Penning a piece for the journal of the American Academy of Neurology, she wrote: "This is a personal story, sadly tragic and heartbreaking, but by sharing this information with you I know that you can help make a difference in the lives of others. As you may know, my husband Robin Williams had the little-known but deadly Lewy body disease (LBD). He died from suicide in 2014 at the end of an intense, confusing, and relatively swift persecution at the hand of this disease's symptoms and pathology. He was not alone in his traumatic experience with this neurologic disease."
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