Denise Richards Daughters Got Her Through Public Scrutiny & Humiliation

Trying to find Mr. Right these days isn't easy, says Denise Richards.
Asked on Wednesday's Ellen DeGeneres Show if she is dating, Charlie Sheen's ex says, "dating-ish. It's hard."

DeGeneres then asks if "dating-ish" is one guy or a bunch of guys.

"Just -ish," says Richards, 38, who will star on the upcoming season of ABC's Dancing With the Stars. "We'll leave it at that."

As a single mom (Sam is 4; Lola is 3), "I don't want to bring someone around my children who have been through enough.""If you're out in public with someone, then [people] automatically think you're with them, so...." she continues.

How does she ever get a chance to meet somebody? "I haven't quite figured that out," she says. "That's the -ish part." She then adds, "Let's say I’m not engaged to anyone."
DeGeneres asks her if she would ever go for Ryan Seacrest, who is executive producer of her E! reality show."I know him, and he knows way too much about me," she says. "He sees the dailies of our show and everything else ... it's almost embarrassing!"

Asked how she got through her rocky split with Sheen and the death of her mother, Richards says, "it was probably the worst few years of my life."

"A lot of public scrutiny and humiliation," she says. "Before my Mom passed away, during the public humiliation of different things I was dealing with, my mom would always say, 'You're a lot stronger than you think. You’ll get through it.'"

"Then, you know, she passed away, so I had to deal with that, which was really difficult," she continues. "But I think it's, you know, my kids. I could've gone one way or the other, and I have two little girls, so I needed to be a parent.... There is a lot of stuff obviously they don't know, but I had to move forward."
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