Kristen Bell Confesses She ‘Cries Weekly’ as Her 2 Daughters Navigate Puberty: ‘It’s Brutal’

Being a Hollywood star doesn’t make parenting any easier for Kristen Bell. The actress is opening up about the struggles of raising two daughters in the thick of puberty, and she isn’t sugarcoating it.

“Do not think because I am on your television that it is easy for me. It’s brutal. I cry weekly,” the 46-year-old told Bustle in an interview published on Thursday, October 22. “Oftentimes when you’re in that cyclone of puberty, you could think, ‘My kid is the only one doing this.’ And that is just simply not a fact.”

The Nobody Wants This star shares daughters Lincoln, 13, and Delta, 11, with husband Dax Shepard. Fans adore Bell for her dry wit and offbeat charm, which she regularly shows off on Instagram. In a January clip, a friend noticed her “interesting” hair tie, only to pull it out and discover it’s actually a pair of panties.

“I make it work,” the Frozen actress told her.

While she’s an open book about plenty, one thing Bell’s followers will never see is her kids’ faces. When the girls do pop up online, their faces are blurred or covered with a heart emoji. Bell and Shepard, 51, fiercely protect their daughters’ privacy.

“My main job in life is to protect those two,” Bell explained to Bustle. “I guess a conclusion we came to at a time in our parenting journey is, like, we can share all the cute things when they’re little, but when they could possibly be exposed to [media] or possibly have a feeling in response to it … well, now, the equation has changed.”

“There’s someone else in the mix, and you have to have enough self-awareness and consideration to consider that person,” she continued. “And that person is my daughter, so she’s No. 1.”