Dax Shepard And Kristen Bell Get Serious About Parenting

Nov 13, 2020

No, parenting is not always rainbows and butterflies. But you knew that already. And so does Dax Shepard and Kristen Bell! Here are some of the moments when the Hollywood couple got real about being a mom and dad.

Actors Kristen Bell, 40, and Dax Shepard, 45, have been together since 2007 and got married in 2013. In the same year that they got married, they welcomed their first child, a daughter named Lincoln Bell Shepard. Dad Dax announced her arrival via Twitter, saying: “Lincoln Bell Shepard is here. She has mom's beauty and dad's obsession with breasts. Hooray!!!”

Then on December 20th, 2014, the couple announced the birth of their second daughter, Delta. Once again, Dax took to Twitter to let everyone know of their new baby. He wrote: “Delta Bell Shepard is here. She doesn't look like either @IMKristenBell or me, but we're gonna keep her anyway. #christmascameearly”

Since Kristen and Dax have been parents for seven years now, we thought it would be good to share seven of the times that parenting got all too real for the celebrity couple.

1. Kristen confessed that she initially lacked a connection to her first daughter, Lincoln. In an interview with Flare magazine back in December 2013, The Good Place star admitted that she did not know how she was going to like Lincoln as much as she likes her dogs.

She told the magazine: “I kept saying to Dax in all sincerity during my pregnancy, ‘I just don’t know how I’m going to like her as much as I like the dogs.’ I was being serious. Because I f*****g love my dogs; they are my children. I love people the more I know them, and I didn’t know her. It could’ve been a water bottle in my belly, that’s about how connected I felt to her during my pregnancy. But within about 24 hours after she came out, my hormones reset, and they reprogrammed my feelings about her.”

2. Kristen eventually found her groove as a new parent. Eight months before the arrival of Delta, Kristen told Us Weekly that she hoped to be a “very hands on” type of mom. “I want to cook for my family and feel present for them. I’m always missing [Lincoln] when I’m not there.”

3. Then in 2015, the voice actor of Anna from Frozen revealed that Lincoln did not care that her mom was famous and that she had never even watched the Disney film. "She's never seen Frozen!" the then 35-year-old actress said to Us Weekly. "She is not my biggest fan. She just doesn't know what I do for a living!" 

4. One parenting strategy that Kristen and Dax use is to wait it out when their daughters are throwing tantrums before they start talking to them as a way of disciplining. “We wait until they calm down and then we talk to them,” said the mom of two.

5. Kristen and Dax have a rule when it comes to arguing in the presence of their daughters: They would make up in front of them, too. According to HuffPost, in an episode of The Motherly Podcast that was released this March, Kristen revealed that Dax made her promise that they would always say sorry to each other and reconcile in front of the girls.

“He said, ‘Let’s make a deal that if we ever make up when we’re behind closed doors, that we role-play the next morning,’” Kristen said in the podcast.

“So every time we’re testy with each other, the next morning I say, ‘Good morning, Daddy. Hey, I just wanted to say last night, I had a really long day and I’m sorry I snapped at you about not having the dinner that you wanted or not having this.’ And he would say, ‘Yeah, you’re right, Mommy. I had a hard day too and I’m really sorry.’” She added that her husband and she would then proceed to kiss and hug even if the children are within earshot.

6. They practise “tag team” parenting. Having two daughters, Kristen and Dax are not outnumbered but they “switch” their kids “all the time.” Speaking to reporters at an event in 2017, Kristen said, “Because if I’m talking to the 2½-year-old, and I’m done, I’ll just be like, ‘We’ve got to switch. I don’t want to talk to this kid anymore.’”

7. The comedy duo told Romper in 2019 that they have learned to be realistic parents. 

"Before I had kids, I was like, 'I'm going to have all wooden toys and they're going to watercolor all day,' and then I got them and I was 'Whoa, turn on the TV!'" Kristen said. Dax had then chimed in, saying, "It's way more about the parents than it is about the kids, this anxiety that I'm not doing it perfectly, as if anyone in history has ever done it perfectly." 

Which one of these moments can you most relate to as a parent? Tell us some of the parenting tricks you have in the comments!