‘s oldest daughter, Luca Bella Facinelli, once found the “Beverly Hills: 90210” alum cutting herself with shattered glass â a moment the actress has described as a life regret that “will stay with you forever.”
In her new memoir, “I Choose Me: Chasing Joy, Finding Purpose & Embracing Reinvention,” Garth, 54, opened up about and self-harm amid the unraveling of her marriage to Dave Abrams and explained how one scary instance in 2017 helped her quickly turn her life around.
“I remember one night [my daughter] Luca came home unexpectedly and unannounced. She was in her early twenties. She found me there alone,” Garth wrote. “I was in my room smashing framed pictures of me and Dave, overcome by the pain, back in that all-too-familiar dark place. I was taking the broken glass from the picture frames and I was trying to cut myself with the jagged pieces.”
Garth shares daughters Luca Bella, 28, Lola Ray, 23, and Fiona Eve, 19, with her ex-husband, Peter Facinelli.
“Not that I wanted to really end my life, but I was certainly not in my right mind and, being that I hate seeing blood, I had no intention of cutting myself deep enough to bleed that much,” she continued. “It was almost an unconscious act, a form of punishment. I looked up from my place on the floor, surrounded by broken glass and all of a sudden Luca was there, witnessing this.”
Garth recalled her daughter taking the glass from her and cleaning up the mess as she buried herself in shame.
“The next morning, I woke up and my self-hatred was at an all-time high,” Garth recalled. “I was being so selfish and self-indulgent, and now I was terrified that I had caused irreparable damage to my relationship with my daughter.”
At that point, the actress had done “so much work” on herself, including therapy and a stint in rehab.
“Still, when I faced this kind of heartbreak and rejection again, I turned to self-destruction,” wrote Garth. “Whenever I felt too much, I shut down. I numbed myself and slipped right back into the old patterns, right back to the way it was. Hadnt I learned anything? Thats what was compounding the anger and self-hatred.”
“And now, I was hurting my daughter by letting her see me like that,” she continued. “This was one of those regrets in life that stay with you forever.”
Garth recalled Luca pleading with her to get healthy again.
“My twenty-three-year-old daughter sat down with me and helped me set up a rigorous on my calendar, which I followed for quite a while. I woke up at seven, meditated on the blue couch, and then journaled. I needed this routineâshe knew it better than I did, amazingly enough. I needed a regimented schedule to anchor myself, to reclaim some control, and to navigate the days without feeling completely adrift. I was drowning in my heartbreak and disdain for myself, and this schedule helped me find a life raft.”
“I felt stuck at an eighteen-year-old level of maturity, without the tools or perspective adulthood brings. I was reeling from pure self-hatred, feeling like an idiot and a failureâthat I couldnt overcome my addiction, that I couldnt get love right, that I couldnt succeed in marriage. Those thoughts came in waves, relentless and heavy, and I had lost sight of the truthâthat vodka and pills wouldnt quiet them, only drown me deeper in them.”
“I had to do better for my girls, if not for myself,” she added.
Garth and Abrams tied the knot in an intimate California ranch wedding in 2015. Abrams filed for divorce from Garth in 2018. One year later, the couple reconciled.
The actress, who portrayed Kelly Taylor in “90210,” kickstarted her career in Hollywood at 17 years old. By 18, she had been diagnosed with depression.
“For a long time, I thought needing help â â made me less than. It felt shameful to be on that kind of medicine as a young woman who seemed to be living the dream,” she wrote.
“I carried the weight of feeling weak and
