'Disgusting' way Kristen Bell fell in love with Dax Shepard resurfaces after he slammed rumors he's 'abusive' and 'controlling' towards her

The 'disgusting' meet-cute between Kristen Bell and now-husband Dax Shepard is being rehashed after he slammed speculation that he is 'abusive' to the actress.

On a recent episode of The Spill podcast, host Laura Brodnik told the story of how Bell 'fell in love' with Shepard back in 2007 after he chewed her used gum at a hockey game.

'Bell was chewing gum. And Dax was like, "Can I get a hit of that?" And she was like, well, "I don't have another piece,"' Brodnik explained to co-host Em Vernem.

'And he's like, "I'll take that." And he took the gum out of her mouth and started chewing it in his mouth.'

According to Brodnik, Bell found the entire interaction 'really hot' and she soon 'fell in love' with Shepard.

Vernem, visibly disgusted by the story, told Brodnik that she did not find the couple's love story 'hot' at all as she jokingly asked: 'And then what did he say, "Are you free next week? Do you wanna go to couples counseling?"'

In the comments on Instagram, fans were clearly nauseated by Brodnik's story.

'Disgusting,' one user wrote, while others reacted in similarly monosyllabic ways, calling the anecdote 'Gross' and 'Vile.'

Another poster even struggled to find the right term to describe how upset they were by the story.

'that made me think of a new term: aggressively gross,' they admitted.

'Ok so it's been a car crash from the start,' one user said of the meet-cute. 

Another fan said they had become 'convinced that's a hostage situation.'

One poster thought Shepard sounded like 'the walking embodiment of "I don't compliment my wife to keep her humble."' 

But a few commenters tried to put a positive spin on the story by suggesting that Bell was a fan of Shepard's alleged behavior, though they were in the minority. 

'See people talking about dax all the time, but have you guys ever thought that she might like that? Or that they are very similar?' 

Bell has previously spoken about her and Shepard's sticky love connection, but it's now going viral again as fans continue to dissect the couple's 'weird' relationship.

'I kind of coyly took it out of my mouth,' Bell, 46, recounted on Sirius XM's Where Everybody Knows Your Name with Ted Danson in 2024. 'And he grabbed it from me, and he goes, "I'll take it."

'Then he put it in his mouth, and I was like, "This guy wants to f*** me." [After] that I was absolutely smitten.' 

Meanwhile, Shepard broke his silence on Tuesday about the renewed public backlash after his 'creepy' comments about Manchild singer Sabrina Carpenter, 27, and Oscar nominee Kate Hudson, 47. 

'Another round of me being a terrible person was in the media, and I avoided that, but then it hit Kristen's doorstep really hard,' he said during his Armchair Expert podcast. 'And then I got to find out everything that people are saying about me.' 

Shepard went on to slam the 'weird narrative' of him being 'controlling, abusive, and now flirting with people in public.' 

Bell first sparked fan outrage, and accusations that she is in 'serious denial' – when she shared a bizarre message celebrating their 12th anniversary in October 2025. 

In the caption, Bell joked about how her husband once promised, ‘I would never kill you,’ a remark that left many social media watchdogs accusing her of trivializing domestic violence – particularly given that October was DV Awareness Month. 

Dale Margolin Cecka, director of the Family Violence Litigation Clinic at Albany Law School, told the Daily Mail at the time that comments like Bell's 'normalize abuse and silence survivors.' 

In an April 2026 episode of Armchair Expert, featuring comedian Nikki Glaser as his guest, Shepard said: ‘I was alerted by someone that this whole thing was happening.

‘Kristen knew through her publicist, but didn’t tell me. So, I actually didn’t know, and this was brought to my attention after a week and a half... I had no clue.

'Someone comforted me, and I had to go to Kristen, like, "What are they talking about?" She’s like, "Oh, that post I had."’

Glaser brought up the controversial anniversary post when she revealed to Shepard that she had considered including a joke about it in her monologue at the 2026 Golden Globes in January.

Glaser said: ‘But I didn’t do it because I’m friends with you. And I was like, "I don’t want to make his life harder."’

‘I definitely want to hear it,’ Shepard encouraged.

Glaser pulled out her iPhone and read the joke: ‘Die, My Love. If I Had Legs, I’d Kick You. Sorry, Baby.’ She added, ‘These are not just Dax Shepard captions for his anniversary post. These are movies nominated tonight.’

Shepard laughed, but admitted that the couple’s overshare was still a hot topic at the Golden Globes.

By then, the media had moved on to the couple's joint interview with Cher, in which the music legend did not hold back her thoughts on Shepard.

‘You’re lucky. She’s definitely the better half,' Bell's Burlesque (2010) co-star continued. 'You must have something that I don’t see.’

The ensuing media firestorm saw the couple fielding questions about the interview on the red carpet. ‘Every interview we did was about Cher,’ Shepard told Glaser.

He continued: ‘The thing that drives me nuts is, like, we released it. We posted it. I think it’s hilarious. That’s why I posted it.’

Danielle Pollack, policy manager for the National Family Violence Law Center at GW Law, also blasted the post.

'While dark humor is sometimes used to defuse the seriousness of domestic abuse and homicide, making flip comments can inadvertently undermine the gravity of these issues and how DV is handled and viewed by society and systems,' she told The Daily Mail. 

'The reality is that femicide is the leading cause of death for pregnant and postpartum women in the U.S., and worldwide, every day, many women are murdered at the hands of their intimate partners or ex-partners.'

Pollack warned that if survivors feel society does not take abuse seriously, 'they can be less incentivized to escape their abuser,' adding that 'flip comments by public figures do send a signal.'