Kristen Bell Says Husband Dax Shepard Changed Her Views On Addiction

“Seeing the world through his eyes has really opened mine to knowing that it is a disease and nobody is choosing to drink more than others," says Bell.

Kristen Bell said that husband Dax Shepard has not only completely changed her views on addiction, but also inspired her to try and help the recovery community.

In a new interview with E!, Bell said that she is inspired by her husband’s 13 years of sobriety. The Zootopia star recently donated $10,000 to PATH (People Assisting The Homeless), an organization which looks to support those who are transitioning out of homelessness and addiction, according to the NY Daily News.

“I have a particular affinity towards helping people who feel outcast whether they’ve made mistakes, like having past felony convictions or recovering addicts,” said Bell. “Seeing the world through his eyes has really opened mine to knowing that it is a disease and nobody is choosing to drink more than others. They are doing it because of a variety of reasons and they deserve the attention of a mental health professional, and not the county jail or however else we’re choosing to pretend we’re fixing the problem.”

Shepard has long been open about his battle with substance abuse. In a 2012 Playboy interview, he said he was fortunate that his addiction didn’t lead to legal consequences.

“I just loved to get fucked up—drinking, cocaine, opiates, marijuana, diet pills, pain pills, everything. Mostly my love was Jack Daniel’s and cocaine,” he said. “I was famous for going out on Thursday night to have a couple of beers and that just led all the way to Saturday night … Of course, come Monday I would be tallying up all the different situations, and each one was progressively more dangerous. I got lucky in that I didn’t go to jail.”

Shepard said that his background was completely different to that of his squeaky-clean wife and that “all the things I’d done were terrifying to her.” More than a decade after getting sober, there are still physical reminders of his past.

“My nose is completely sideways from a drunken altercation. I’m missing a knuckle because of a drunken altercation,” he said to Playboy. “I ended up in a car accident with a [Hawaii] local on the way to get coke, which didn’t stop us from going to get coke.”

But since then, the Punk’d star “has a pretty good handle on my ‘isms.” However, he acknowledged that “it takes a long time … I’m still on nicotine. I pound about a dozen of those Commit throat lozenges a day. I still drink gallons of coffee.”