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The last time we really talked about Kristen Bell she was still promoting that tone deaf “purple people” kids book, in the middle of the Black Lives Matter movement, with no explanation other than “let’s all just get along and focus on our similarities.” She’s also been vocal about protecting her daughters’ identities, while telling deeply personal stories about them. File this story under that category although it’s not as bad as some of the other stuff she’s said. Kristen says her two daughters, Delta, 5, and Lincoln, 7, regularly drink their dad’s non-alcoholic beer, O’Douls, and that she was recently embarrassed when they did it during a Zoom break for their class.
[Kristen Bell] appears on Tuesday’s premiere episode of the Say Yes! with Carla Hall podcast, where she reveals Delta, 5½, and Lincoln, 7, have developed a taste for an unconventional beverage in support of Dax Shepard’s path toward maintaining his sobriety for the past 16 years.
“I’m going to get a lot of flack for this. And let me start by saying I don’t care,” Bell, 40, prefaces her story. “You’re allowed to give me any advice you guys want, any of these listeners. You’re welcome to tell me I’m a terrible parent. I don’t care. I’m a great parent, I think. I’m learning every day.”
“My husband brought home a six-pack of O’Doul’s last night. And my daughters often ask for O’Doul’s,” the mother of two continues, stressing that the drink is “nonalcoholic” (according to the O’Doul’s website, “less than 0.5 percent alcohol by volume”) and revealing that her girls have “been at restaurants and ordered” the beers.
“The reason for this is because when we first had our child and my husband would put her in the BABYBJÖRN and we’d walk around the neighborhood, he’d pop a nonalcoholic beer in his hand and the baby would paw at it and put the rim in her mouth,” she adds. “It’s a sentimental thing for my girls, right? It makes them feel close to their dad.”
The previous night, the girls had O’Doul’s with Shepard, 45, while the family was eating dinner together. “We’re like, ‘I mean, there’s nothing wrong with it. It’s just essentially a bubbly juice.’ Right? There’s nothing in it,” Bell says. “We also talk to them very much about [Dax’s] sobriety and the importance of it and why Daddy can’t drink.”
The girls have even taken to drinking the beers during their daily activities — like during their Zoom school sessions, which the Frozen voice actress says she assumes raises a few questions.
“They have 15-minute breaks where they’re allowed to jump around and grab a snack and wiggle it out. And I walk in to check on them at 9:30 and both of them are drinking an O’Doul’s on their Zooms,” she recalls. “They’re both just sipping their Doulies. And I’m like, ‘What must these other parents and teachers think of me?’ ”
“And then I remind myself, ‘You don’t care, Kristen. They can pretend like you’re doing something wrong.’ I would argue that I’m not, because it’s nonalcoholic,” Bell adds. “If anything, it opens up the discussion for why Daddy has to drink nonalcoholic beer, because some people lose their privileges with drinking. Drinking’s not always safe.”
Kids drink mocktails and Shirley Temples and I don’t really have a problem with them drinking O’Douls. It tastes terrible so I’d question why they’d want to. Again, my issue is with Kristen telling this on a podcast. These kids may have their identities technically hidden online, but when they grow up they’re going to see stories about that time they had worms, how they wore diapers past age 5 and how they drank their dad’s near beer.
As an aside, Dax goes to AA and I’ve been shamed in AA for drinking non-alcoholic beer, mostly by the old timers. They were trying to tell me it was a gateway drink. (Also O’Doul’s is terrible, Becks NA beer is the only decent American fake beer. German NA beer is quite good.) I know all meetings are different though. I don’t think it’s a threat to my sobriety.
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