This Is For You, Dad Claire's Making Memories

The star has a supporting role at home.

- Sophie Neville

When Claire Chitham treads the boards in her latest play, there will be laughter, jokes and merriment in spades. It comes as something of a relief for the 39-year-old Kiwi actress, who for the past few years has been privately dealing with a heartbreaking family health crisis.

Bravely opening up to Woman’s Day, she tells us that her beloved dad Bryan, 71, is suffering from a rare and devastating type of dementia called Primary Progressive Aphasia, a degenerative disorder affecting the language functions of the brain.

“It’s incredibly heartbreaking to lose someone right in front of your eyes,” she says, explaining that the disease affects her dad’s ability to speak, read and communicate. “It’s the hardest thing to comprehend and even though it’s been happening for several years now, I still get hit by waves of grief. It’s been a rocky road for my whole family.”

Claire was living in Los Angeles back in 2014 when her mum Melanie mentioned that something seemed “not quite right” with her salesman dad. Brushing it off, Claire assumed all would be well, but a visit home at Christmas was a wake-up call. “It’s hard to pinpoint what exactly the problem was, but there were words he couldn’t quite get out or you’d get the feeling he couldn’t follow certain things when you were talking,” she tells. “You could see him struggling.”

A visit to the doctor led to many months of uncertainty as specialists searched for answers.