Jennie Garth and her husband, Dave Abrams, initially slept in separate bedrooms after their 2015 wedding — all to accommodate her kids from a previous marriage.
“We waited. When the kids were home, I slept in the guest room,” Abrams, 42, said on the Wednesday, May 8, episode of Garth’s “I Choose Me” podcast. “It feels like it was, literally, like, warp-speed. I went from that to stepdad.”
Garth, 52, and Abrams got engaged three months after they were set up on a blind date by mutual friends. Their wedding was the second for Garth, who was previously married to actor Peter Facinelli. The Beverly Hills, 90210 alum and Facinelli, 50, share daughters Luca, 26, Lola, 21, and Fiona, 17. (Facinelli has since moved on with Lily Anne Harrison, with whom he welcomed son Jack in 2022.)
After Garth and Abrams tied the knot, she noted that his “life changed drastically” from being a bachelor to a stepfather of three.
“All of sudden, I’m taking them to school [and] walking them to class,” Abrams recalled. “They were still in the lower school … and [Jennie] had stuff to do and we were delegating between [when] Peter had them one week and then we had them one week.”
For Garth, it was amazing to see her new husband “jump in with both feet” into dad mode.
“You dove in,” she said. “But I think because we did fast-track everything, there was a lot of learning and growing on both our parts, but mostly your part. I mean in like, having a family and having all these responsibilities put upon you and having to model for the kids a certain behavior.”
While Garth stressed that they had to figure out how to “get on the same page” about parenting, Abrams didn’t see it as a challenge.
“If you take a step back and look at the bigger picture, the kids were involved and that’s the main thing,” he said. “Then all your crazy stuff that’s going on in your head that it may seem crazy overwhelming, well you made this choice. We had to figure this out.”
Abrams further praised therapy for helping the couple navigate their new dynamics.
“I’m really proud of us,” Garth replied, noting that they overcame an “impasse” in their relationship. “Finding somebody, like [when] I found you, I knew, ‘This is a good man. This is a person I can see in my home, I can see around my kids and I can see growing into who we’re going to be as a couple. I can see that with him.’ You were very willing and seemed like you wanted it too.”
Garth and Abrams had briefly separated in 2017 but ultimately called off their divorce.
