Jennie Garth reveals what really started Shannen Doherty rivalry

NEW YORK – Actress Jennie Garth knows her husband, Dave Abrams, has divorce papers, tucked inside a manila envelope, somewhere in the house. She’s already signed them. He has not.

The couple married in 2013 and separated in 2017. Abrams filed for divorce a year later, but in 2019, the two reconciled after a retreat to Joshua Tree. Abrams brought the documents on the trip, thinking he might sign and finalize the agreement.

The solitude of the desert helped them realize that they were meant for each other, Garth writes in her new memoir “I Choose Me: Chasing Joy, Finding Purpose & Embracing Reinvention,” (out now from Park Row Books).

How did the soulmates get so close to the brink? Garth points to the stress of unsuccessful in-vitro fertilization (IVF). “We were both going through all of these intense emotions individually and we weren’t coming together and being there for one another because we were both just so upset and afraid,” Garth, 54, tells USA TODAY. “That just kind of clogged the communication more and more.”

Garth has been on a physical and mental health journey since her days as Kelly Taylor on the iconic teen soap “Beverly Hills, 90210,” which spanned a decade and defined a generation of TV. Excursions to Bali and therapy helped. Diets and food deprivation did not.

In the memoir, the actress imparts a few lessons she’s learned along the way, including the theory of “We’ll See,” based on a Chinese parable where a farmer doesn’t get immediately attached to outcomes, instead waiting to see how things play out. There’s also her view on marriage as “a circle, square, circle,” where each partner is their own, individual circle and the square is in the middle, “where we actively put energy and focus where our relationship lives.”

Part of the shared energy in her marriage is their mutual commitment to sobriety. Garth is candid throughout her memoir about her history of substance abuse, specifically mixing alcohol with prescription pills. Abrams owns a bar, The Douglas, near Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles.

“He got sober by choice and I decided to just do it with him,” Garth says. “The more I (didn’t drink), the better I felt. My sleep is more important to me than that martini.” Garth has now been sober for “a few years.”

Team Kelly or Team Brenda? Fans made an on-screen rivalry a real thing

Garth’s memoir covers her origins, growing up in Illinois and Arizona before taking the leap at 17 and moving to Hollywood with her mother to chase her dreams. Like the character she portrayed on TV, Garth found it easy to get along with everyone. But as the show’s love triangle between Kelly, Dylan (played by Luke Perry) and Brenda (Shannen Doherty) grew, so did a rivalry between the real-life actresses.

When the cast would meet fans of the show, Garth recalls, “it became apparent that you were either ‘Team Kelly’ or ‘Team Brenda.’

“We didn’t know how to navigate all of the things that were being thrown at us at such a fast pace,” she continues. (This was long before the days of social media. Garth laughs at the impact it could have had: “Oh, that would’ve been a disaster,” she says. “If there was Instagram or TikTok when the show was on in the ’90s. I can’t even imagine, given how crazy it already was without it.”)

There was little guidance on how to separate life from art. “It was unfortunate the way the show—­and then, the world—­pitted us against each other,” Garth writes of Doherty. “It didn’t serve us in supporting each other, but I still learned a lot from her. She taught me how to walk through fire without flinching. She taught me how to stand up to people who tried to shrink us.”Today, she has much more perspective on the drama. “I give us all actually a lot of credit because we have all turned into really good adults. I’m really proud of the relationships that we formed then and now,” she says. “And that includes absolutely my relationship with Shannen. She was an incredible woman.”

Garth can still remember exactly where she was when she found out Perry and Doherty died in 2019 and 2024, respectively. Their deaths inspired her to live her life to the fullest.

“When you go through grief and loss, you start to have just a new appreciation for every moment,” Garth says. “And when you lose someone suddenly, that really puts that in perspective. You also realize at a certain age that you get one shot at this life, you know?”

Garth suffered memory loss. It may have been linked to the ‘90210’ set.

In “I Choose Me,” Garth writes that in 2020, she sought out Dr. Daniel Amen to diagnose her struggles with depression, anxiety and memory loss. A brain scan showed evidence of a past brain injury. Garth recalls two incidents from filming “Beverly Hills, 90210” in which she may have suffered a concussion. The first happened while Garth and Perry were filming on a boat in the ocean. The crew took a break for lunch and the two actors, with their bodyguards, rode back to the shore on separate jet skis. Garth says she got caught in a fisherman’s line off the pier and was “yanked into the water.”

“(Luke) must have been behind me because that’s when his jet ski hit me in the head,” she says. “I just went underwater and the next thing I remember was just being pulled up by my life preserver.”

After a quick checkup at a local hospital, accompanied by Perry, the two resumed filming later in the day.

“I remember the paramedic was saying, ‘Who’s the president of the United States?'” Garth recalls. “And I remember Luke saying, ‘Don’t ask her that. She doesn’t know!’ That’s how our relationship was.”

In a separate incident, Garth remembers a halogen light fixture falling from a rig and smashing into her head. Unlike the jet ski accident, she doesn’t remember what happened after the incident, only noting that there was blood and she lost “a few strands of hair.”

“Sets are a lot more professional now than they used to be,” Garth notes. “In the ’90s, it was kind of like a free for all. People were smoking off camera while they’re delivering their lines off camera to you. They tried to hold the cigarette back so the smoke didn’t cover the lens.

“We were kids, so we were just doing whatever kids do.”

Jennie Garth is a certified Swiftie

Now a mom in Hollywood in her 50s—she shares three daughters with ex-husband Peter Facinelli, Luca, 28, Lola, 23 and Fiona, 19—Garth acknowledges how hard it is to make connections later in life. She’s trying to change this for herself, and the Eras Tour helped.

Garth agreed to go on a girls trip with her daughter and another mother-daughter pair to see Taylor Swift in Miami. While the daughters were friends, the mothers didn’t know each other. Garth typically wouldn’t have agreed (she had previously caught one of the artist’s concerts in Los Angeles), but knew this would be something her daughter would always remember.

The two mothers hit it off and remain friends.

“There’s people out there that are role models who shouldn’t be, and then there are people that handle it with class and dignity,” Garth says. “I think Taylor’s really done a beautiful job of caring enough about her fans to be a good influence on them.”

Her daughter Lola is now one of her collaborators: She helps her mom with a clothing line sold through QVC. Garth will add a home decor collection to her repertoire in July, in addition to her podcast and live event ventures with iHeartMedia.

“I feel like for so long life was just rolling and I was rolling with the punches,” Garth says. “And now as an adult, I feel like I do have a better perspective and I can make choices that feel like the right ones. Just the freedom to be able to choose, ‘What do I want for this next chapter of my life?’

“For me, I wanted to build something in my 50s that I had always dreamed of building, something that I could leave for my girls one day.”

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Jennie Garth reveals the surprising thing that saved her marriage