Dax Shepard has come forward to reveal that he was molested as a child.
“It took me 12 years to tell anyone,” the 41-year-old said on Sirius XM’s “The Jason Ellis Show” on Monday. “And then all that time, I was like … ‘It’s my fault,’ as generic as that is, I’m like, I’m gay, I must have manifested this because I’m secretly gay.’ I had all these insane thoughts for 11 years or 12 years.”
Shepard, who described the molestation as “minimal,” said that he feels it played a part in his struggle with addiction later in life, according to USA Today. This was confirmed by a statistic his mother, who is a court-appointed advocate for foster children, came across during her work.
“If you’ve been molested, you only have a 20 percent chance of not being an addict,” the actor said. “And I was like, ‘Hm, interesting,’ because in my mind I just like to have a f-----g great time. But when you hear a statistic like that, I’m like, ‘Oh no, I was going to be an addict, period.’ ”
Shepard, who is married to actress Kristen Bell, has been sober since 2004.
This article originally appeared in the New York Post's Page Six.