Frankie Muniz is only 31 years old and already he’s been touched by many health issues, including long-term memory loss. The former Malcolm in the Middle star speaks out about what he’s been struggling with the last couple of years.
“It’s something that I never really wanted to talk about because I’m just me and this is my life,” he said in an interview with People. “But we were talking about Malcolm and how it started, and I don’t really have memories of being on the show.”
He starred in the show from 2000 to 2006 and he credits his mother for trying to help him remember that part of his life which is now blocked off from his memory. “Over the past 10 years, my mom will bring up things like trips we went on, or big events and they are new stories to me,” says Muniz. “I don’t know what the cause of it is. It’s not something I looked into, I just thought it was how my brain is–so I thought it was normal. I didn’t know I should remember going to the Emmy’s when I was younger.”
“I’m not a doctor person,” he says. “Every time I go to the doctors they just tell me I’m crazy.” After the show ended, Muniz competed as a professional race car driver, and in 2009 he suffered a serious car crash, where he endured several concussions, which may be the reason he suffered memory loss.
“I have had nine concussions and I’ve had a fair amount of mini-strokes,” he said. “I’m not saying those things correlate exactly to the reason why my memory’s not great.”
“I’ve never been to the doctor and been like, you know, ‘Why don’t I have a memory?’ ” he said. “To be honest, I’ve never really talked about it.”
His girlfriend Paige also helps him with his memory loss, she writes everything that they do together, that way if he forgets something, he just reads the journals. ” She’s amazing,” he says. “She literally writes because I get sad at the thought of losing the memories. So she writes in a journal that I can look at every day and it’s really cool because it has amazing detail. She started doing that about a year ago and hopefully, she’ll continue. She’s awesome. She’s very supportive. I hope we have a lot more memories [together].”
“My most memorable year is 2017 because I learned to live in the present,” said Muniz. “I’m happy with my acting career, I’m happy with the decision I made to drive race cars and to focus on music. Even if I don’t remember it all, I’m happy.”