{"id":372113,"date":"2026-04-10T00:18:11","date_gmt":"2026-04-10T00:18:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/372113\/"},"modified":"2026-04-10T00:18:11","modified_gmt":"2026-04-10T00:18:11","slug":"dax-shepard-breaks-down-in-tears-detailing-kristen-bells-surprise-for-his-dying-dad","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/372113\/","title":{"rendered":"Dax Shepard breaks down in tears detailing Kristen Bell’s surprise for his dying dad"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dax Shepard<\/a> opened up about grief in a new conversation with Anderson Cooper<\/a>, and there wasn\u2019t a dry eye in the house as he shared Kristen Bell<\/a>\u2019s touching gesture during his father\u2019s final days.<\/p>\n

In 2012, the actor was at the peak of his career as a regular on NBC\u2019s Parenthood, with a child of his own on the way, when his father, Dave Shepard, was diagnosed with small-cell carcinoma.<\/p>\n

Every weekend for months, Dax traveled home to Detroit to care for his dad and bring him to medical appointments, while his heavily pregnant fianc\u00e9e stayed behind in Los Angeles.<\/p>\n

As the aggressive cancer took over, \u201can unending parade\u201d of well-wishers showed up at Dave\u2019s hospital room to say their final goodbyes. And while their intentions were pure, it was bittersweet for his son.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was starting to resent that I couldn\u2019t just be in there with my dad, and I was starting to get quite overwhelmed with that,\u201d Shepard told Cooper. \u201cI went outside to sit in the car to get a breather, and I called Kristen to vent about it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Fourteen years later, the emotion was still raw as he got choked up recounting the story to Cooper and the live audience gathered at the New Orleans Book Festival <\/a>at Tulane University.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was complaining, and she said, \u2018It\u2019s okay, I\u2019m here. Look to the left\u2019\u2026 and she\u2019s standing there seven-months pregnant,\u201d he recalled.<\/p>\n

Shepard continued about \u201cintuitive\u201d Bell, \u201cShe knew I was struggling\u00a0and she had flown [from L.A.] and not told me and figured out\u00a0where this hospital was and was standing next to\u00a0the car. Yeah. What a champ, you know.\u201d<\/p>\n

Alone with Dave in his hospital room, the couple got a quiet moment to allow him to say \u201chello\u201d and, ultimately, goodbye to the grandchild growing inside Bell. \u201cHe got to feel her belly,\u201d said Shepard as a photo of the memory was shown on a screen to the audience. \u201cLook how cute she looks with that belly,\u201d he gushed.<\/p>\n

Cooper, who also spoke of grieving the losses of his father, brother, and mother (fashion designer Gloria Vanderbilt), then read aloud a 2013 blog post<\/a> Shepard wrote detailing the sweet moment.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe lifted her shirt up and he put his hand on her swollen stomach. He left it there for the better part of an hour. He was smiling from ear to ear, sitting contently, unable to put together a sentence, but still capable of connecting to the new family member we were creating. He wasn\u2019t going to make it to the birth, but that didn\u2019t get in the way of him meeting the new baby.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cooper himself got choked up as he continued reading, \u201cIt was an emotional and triumphant moment. One I will never forget. If I live to be a thousand, I will still be in debt to my wife for giving him that one last thrill.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Kristen<\/p>\n

Kristen Bell and Dax Shepard in 2026
Credit: Stefanie Keenan\/Getty<\/p>\n

Dave Shepard passed away in late December 2012; three months later, Shepard and Bell welcomed their first daughter, Lincoln, in March 2013.<\/p>\n

Get your daily dose of entertainment news, celebrity updates, and what to watch with our\u00a0EW Dispatch newsletter<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The couple got married in October of that year, and they became a family of four with the birth of second daughter Delta in December 2014.<\/p>\n

Read the original article on Entertainment Weekly<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Dax Shepard opened up about grief in a new conversation with Anderson Cooper, and there wasn\u2019t a dry…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":372114,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[113771,430,194454,16903,156,194455,26454,111,139,69],"class_list":{"0":"post-372113","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-celebrities","8":"tag-anderson-cooper","9":"tag-celebrities","10":"tag-dave-shepard","11":"tag-dax-shepard","12":"tag-entertainment","13":"tag-hospital-room","14":"tag-kristen-bell","15":"tag-new-zealand","16":"tag-newzealand","17":"tag-nz"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/372113","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=372113"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/372113\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/372114"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=372113"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=372113"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=372113"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}