Originally appeared on E! Online
Ryan Reynolds’ latest family update comes with a heartfelt message.
Days after the “Deadpool & Wolverine” star revealed the name of his and Blake Lively’s fourth baby, Olin, he confirmed their youngest child is a boy.
The actor — also dad to James, 9, Inez, 7, and Betty, 4, with Lively — shared the news during a moving conversation with a man named John Bell, whose late son Jake Bell loved “Deadpool.”
Following his son’s death in July 2020, Bell struggled greatly with his mental health. It was during his grief journey that he was inspired to help others facing trauma in their lives. Thus, creating the nonprofit organization Walking 4 Hope, which “supports families and young people who find it difficult to deal with the pressures that day-to-day life presents,” according to its website.
“What I do now keeps me alive daily,” Bell said in an interview shared to Reynolds’ social media July 26, “because I’ve made my peace with death. I’m gonna be reunited with him at some point but it damn right ain’t now.”
And Bell’s journey is showing others that they’re not alone.
“The resilience it takes to put one foot in front of the other, as many times as you’ve done it, and transmute that much grief into something powerfully useful,” Reynolds told Bell. “I’m very grateful that you shared his story.”
“I want to share with you that I too have a son,” the 47-year-old continued, “and if I love him 1/10th as much as you love Jake, I feel like I’ve done a pretty damn good job.”
After Reynolds posted their conversation, Bell shared his gratitude for the “Just Friends” star.
“I don’t know how I have managed to keep quiet for so long,” Bell wrote on X July 26. “I can not even begin to express what this man Ryan has done for me personally and for our charity @Walking4Hope.”
“But I never forget the foundations,” he added. “I want to express my gratitude to everyone who has gotten behind me and our cause.”
Though Reynolds and Lively keep much of their family life private, he did share the name of their baby boy while sending a message to his loved ones at the “Deadpool & Wolverine” premiere July 22.
“I want to start by saying thank you to my wife Blake, who is here,” he told the audience. “I want to thank my kids James, Inez, Betty, Olin, who are here: I hope that, if I’m lucky, this moment will be the most traumatic thing — that is, the contents of this movie — that happens in your wondrous life.”
And while Reynolds has a close bond with his kids, he recently joked with E! News that they prefer his costar Hugh Jackman.
“They watched ‘The Greatest Showman’ more than the editor for ‘The Greatest Showman,’” he quipped. “And sometimes I come home, and this guy’s actually acting it out with them and that’s kind of amazing.”
Blake Lively loves to roast husband Ryan Reynolds. The star and her pal Gigi Hadid spoke with Access Hollywood at the premiere of “Deadpool & Wolverine” where she joked about him being a “millennial girl” saying she’s his “only friend.” “Deadpool & Wolverine” hits theaters July 26.
