On Saturday, actress Kristen Bell posted a heartfelt message on her Instagram page in which she congratulated her husband, actor Dax Shepard, on 14 years of sobriety:
Here’s the text in full (minor corrections made for clarity):
To the man mocked me in our wedding photos because I cried too many tears of joy, who wore a baby Bjorn for two straight years to show his girls how to be as adventurous as possible, who held our dear little shakey mann pup for eight hours straight on the day we had to put him down – I know how much you loved using. I know how much it got in your way. And I know because I saw how hard you worked to live without it.
I will forever be in awe of your dedication and the level of fierce moral inventory you perform on yourself, like an emotional surgery, every single night. You never fail to make amends or say sorry when it’s needed. You are always available to guide me, and all of our friends, with open ears and tough love when it’s needed most.
You have become the fertilizer in the garden of our life, encouraging everyone to grow.
I’m so proud that you have never been ashamed of your story, but instead shared it widely with the hope it might inspire someone else to become the best version of themselves. You have certainly inspired me to do so.
I love you more than I ever thought I could love anyone, and I want you to know I see you. I see how hard you work. You set an excellent example of being human. Happy 14th year sobriety birthday, @daxshepard. Xoxo.
Shepard has been vocal about his past addiction to drugs and alcohol. In 2016, during an appearance on “The Jason Ellis Show,” he revealed that he’d been molested as a child, citing that as a potential reason he took to his former addictions:
My mom is a court-appointed advocate for kids in foster care, right? This is what she does in her retirement up in Oregon. And she goes to all these weekend workshops to stay abreast of all the different things that they’re learning about kids with all these different issues…
So, she called me not too long ago and she said, “You know, I was just in this seminar this weekend and I learned that if you’ve been molested, you only have a 20% chance of not being an addict.”
And I was like, “Hm, interesting,” because in my mind, I just like to f****** have a great time – but when you hear a statistic like that, I’m like, “Oh no, I was going to be an addict, period.”
In 2016, Shepard sent out a message on social media in which he acknowledged his 12-year sobriety anniversary:
In the comments below the tweet, numerous twitter users noted how long they have been sober, and several even thanked Shepard himself for helping them conquer their addiction.