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‘90210′ Star Reveals Dark Details of Her Life After the Show Ended

The 1990s TV star recalled having her stomach pumped after divorcing her second husband.

Roosa RahkonenReporter, The Looker

PublishedApr 8, 2026, 3:42 PM EDT

UpdatedApr 8, 2026, 3:42 PM EDT

Updated Apr 8, 2026, 3:42 PM EDTPublished Apr 8, 2026, 3:42 PM EDT

Beverly Hills, 90210 star Jennie Garth reflected back on her time on the ‘90s hit show—and revealed details of the dramatic events that followed.

In her new memoir, I Choose Me: Chasing Joy, Finding Purpose & Embracing Reinvention, releasing on April 14, Garth shares emotional details of how the show personally impacted her.

“My whole life has been sort of things just coming at me,” Garth, 54, told People. “Fame, marriage, divorce, marriage, divorce, children… It’s always been happening, and I’ve just been swimming and trying to keep up and really doing the best I could do.”

Garth was only 18 when she shot into fame as Kelly Taylor on Fox’s teen drama Beverly Hills, 90210, which premiered in 1990 and ran until 2000.

“It happened so fast, and I was not equipped for just a regular life at that time, let alone that kind of fame and notoriety across the world,” she recalled. “It was like the Beatles, and there was no preparation for it.”

Garth told People that fame brought intense anxiety, making her take extreme steps to guard her privacy, like avoiding eye contact.

“That led me into a very isolated existence,” she admitted.

In her memoir, Garth writes that fame made her more critical of her appearance, which led her to restrict her calorie intake and undergo breast implant surgery.

Behind the scenes of the hit show, she also struggled with her relationships with her co-stars.

Garth’s character, Kelly, was a friend-turned-rival of Brenda Walsh, portrayed by the late Shannen Doherty on the show. The onscreen feud began to ripple into the pair’s off-screen relationship, Garth said.

“The whole world pitted us against one another,” Garth recalled. “I just realized how terrible it was to put us in that position, and nobody was guiding us.”

The era, too, played a role in their dynamic.

“Nobody was getting therapy then,” Garth said. “Nobody was talking to us about things. We were both just fending for ourselves.”

“It did reach points of conflict,” she revealed, but added that despite the issues, she was grateful for their relationship. “Even though at times it was complicated, it was still really good.”

Garth also recalled falling in love with her co-star Luke Perry, who played Dylan McKay on 90210.

“It really was confusing,” she said. “It really got a little blurry at times. A lot of intimate conversations and moments between these two characters. I got caught up in it, you know, and I allowed myself to think that it was real.”

The relationship did not extend beyond the screen, and the two later developed a close friendship.

During the show’s 10-season run, Garth went through several major life events, including divorcing her first husband, Daniel Clark, in 1996, and welcoming her first child, Luca, with Twilight actor Peter Facinelli in 1997.

“I had a baby, and it really did sort of separate me from the rest of the group because every second that I had to myself, I would run back to the trailer and be with my baby and breastfeed and all the things that you do as a mom,” she recalled.

After the show wrapped in 2000, Garth married Facinelli, and the couple welcomed two more daughters: Lola in 2002 and Fiona in 2006.

But the 17-year relationship ultimately fell apart in 2012. Garth struggled in its wake.

In her memoir, Garth recounts her lowest moment, during which she mixed alcohol and pills. This resulted in the actress’s stomach being pumped.

This event was the catalyst for Garth completely changing her lifestyle, and she signed herself into a luxury rehab center, Canyon Ranch. She has been sober since.

In December 2014, Garth found love with Dave Abrams, 44, whom she met on a double-blind date and married less than a year later in July 2015.

After the wedding, the couple struggled with IVF treatments and miscarriages. In 2018, Garth learned from the celebrity gossip website TMZ that Abrams was filing for divorce.

“I really wanted to give Dave a baby because he was young and all of his friends were having kids and I just thought that’s what he needed,” Garth recalled.

She continued, “It all comes down to people-pleasing. Once you really get to the core of what you want for your life, that’s when everything seems to get easier."

The couple reconciled less than a year later in 2019. They now live together in Southern California and ultimately decided not to pursue a larger family.

Roosa RahkonenReporter, The Looker

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