Eight years will have passed on Thursday when the well-known actor passed away.
The heartbreaking news that Robin Williams had killed himself shocked the entire world on August 11, 2014.
The actor was a household name in the entertainment business and was renowned all over the world for his wit and humour. He is best known for his roles in Mrs. Doubtfire and Good Will Hunting.
He had, however, struggled with numerous health issues in the year prior to his passing owing to an undisclosed illness.
As a result of expressing “gut pain” at a celebration for his and his wife Susan Schneider’s second wedding anniversary, the actor endured stomach cramps, indigestion, and digestive issues.
He later went on to develop a resting tremor in his left hand, which was thought to be brought on by a prior shoulder injury.
He subsequently began to experience problems with his vision and sense of smell, which made him more worried and disrupted his sleep.
He eventually had motor disturbances that occasionally caused him to freeze in mid-motion.
Managing the symptoms was like “playing whack-a-mole,” Schneider told New York Times culture reporter Dave Itzkoff for his biography Robin.
Not all of the symptoms will manifest at once, as if in a continuous procession, she said.
It reminded me of a whack-a-mole game. Which symptom is it this month? I questioned whether my husband was a hypochondriac. There are no solutions, despite the fact that we have tried everything.
Williams’ appearance allegedly underwent a significant transformation in just a few months, according to friend and fellow actor Billy Crystal.
When they went to see a performance in the fall of 2013, he was “taken aback by how he seemed” because he was “thinner and appears vulnerable,” according to Crystal.
As they said their goodbyes and the evening drew to an end, Williams started crying.
Before a cause for his symptoms could be identified, he did, however, film scenes for the third film in the Night in the Museum series, in which he played Theodore Roosevelt.
He acknowledged to his makeup artist Cheri Minns that after experiencing a panic attack and crying on set, he no longer “knew how to be funny.”
After being given antipsychotic medications that only made things worse, Schneider wrote to the medical journal Neurology that he was “losing his mind and he was aware of it.”
The couple was ultimately informed by doctors that Williams had Parkinson’s disease in May 2014. The comedian, however, refused to accept the diagnosis, and in spite of care, medication, and tests, his health got worse.
At the age of 63, he committed suicide on August 11 of the same year.
Depression was initially blamed for the problem. He did, however, have Lewy body dementia, according to a postmortem study.
This severe, incurable brain disorder can cause confusion, tiredness, hallucinations, and problems with cognition, memory, and judgement.
It was one of the worst cases they had ever seen, according to medical professionals.
Due to the fact that Parkinson’s disease exhibits many of the same symptoms, it is frequently misunderstood to be this.
The week before he died, Williams was supposed to have more brain scans. Schneider, however, asserts that what eventually motivated him to attempt suicide was his worry over the test findings.
In an interview with the Guardian from last year, she said: “He might not have wanted to leave. He most likely thought he would languish in jail forever.