Dax Shepard Had A ‘Deep Fear’ He Would Not Love Again After Split From Ex of Nine Years

The 50-year-old actor — who just celebrated his 12th wedding anniversary with Kristen Bell — invited his ex-girlfriend Briegh Morrison on for a special segment of his Armchair Expert podcast called “Mom’s Car.” During the segment, Dax and his co-host Aaron Weakley drives their guests around in Bell’s car.

While Shepard and Morrison were discussing their past open relationship, Shepard described their split after nine years together as “amicable”.

“The breakup was manageable, but I will say, for a while, I did think, ‘Well, I’ll never be in love with someone again in that way. I had a deep fear.’ I’m like, ‘Oh, I don’t think I’ll ever really feel the way I felt about Briegh with anybody.’ I was quite scared of that,” he shared.

Morrison, on the other hand, was focused on losing the life she thought she was going to have with Shepard and if it was something she wanted.

“One of the hardest things about when we broke up was that I really had my head around we were gonna have kids; we had a house now, was gonna be this thing that I want. I was getting on in years,” Morrison added.

“I was just so hopeful that you would find someone that you loved a lot again,” Morrison told Shepard.

And that he did. Shepard went on to marry Bell in 2013 — after dating since 2007 — and now has two daughters with the Nobody Wants This star, Lincoln, 12 and Delta, 10.

Morrison also moved on and married Brad Winderbaum, a production and development executive at Marvel Studios. 

When Morrison and Shepard broke up and Shepard moved on with Bell, Morrison remained close with his family. While some couples would find it difficult to allow their partner to spend time with an ex-partner, Shepard shared that Bell was understanding of the situation.

“I think initially when Kristen and I started dating, you were still coming over a lot because my mom was living at my house. You were around even in like the first month or two we were dating,” Shepard recalled.

“And she had initially was like, ‘This is really wild. I’m not friends with any of my exes. I don’t hang out with any.’ And I’m like, ‘I’m friends with all mine, pretty much,'” he recalled saying at the time.

 “Over time, she got super comfortable with it and absolutely at ease with it,” he added.

Watch more from the interview below.