BOY MEETS WORLD star Danielle Fishel, who competed on Season 34 of DANCING WITH THE STARS, opened up about what motherhood has taught her.
“The thing I don’t think anyone could prepare you for when you’re an involved parent with your kids is how often you have to parent yourself while parenting them,” Fishel said, per PEOPLE.
The actress is raising two sons, Adler, 7, and Keaton, 4, with her husband, Jensen Karp, whom she married in 2018.
Fishel said the biggest surprise of motherhood wasn’t sleepless nights or scheduling logistics. It was discovering how often her own emotional reactions needed managing before she could respond well to her children.
“I have to self-regulate before I can even handle them in that situation,” she said.
She explained that her kids’ words or behavior sometimes trigger feelings that have little to do with the moment itself. Rather than reacting on impulse, Fishel said she has learned to pause and trace the emotion back to its actual source before she engages with her sons at all.
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That kind of self-awareness isn’t a bad word of advice for any parent, Christian or otherwise. Scripture has plenty to say about a soft answer turning away wrath and about self-control ranking among the fruits of a well-tended spirit — and Fishel’s version of that wisdom, translated into the language of modern parenting culture, still lands in roughly the same place: check your own heart before you correct someone else’s.
Fishel also shared a lighter strategy for defusing the everyday chaos of raising young kids. When a meltdown looms, she tries to turn the problem into a game instead of a battle.
“No matter what the situation is, no matter what the meltdown is, turn it into a game,” she said.
If one of her sons can’t find his pajama bottoms at bedtime, for instance, Fishel might declare it “crazy pajama night” instead of letting frustration take over. Fellow “Cart Blanche” guest and father of two Lance Bass backed up the approach, telling her, “I love that.”
Fishel’s candor about motherhood isn’t new. In a 2019 essay for GOOD MORNING AMERICA, she wrote about the “mom guilt” that followed Adler’s premature birth, which came more than four weeks early after doctors found fluid in his chest.
Adler needed several weeks of medical care, and feeding complications forced a switch from breast milk to specialized formula. Fishel recalled wondering whether she had somehow caused his health problems, and later questioned whether returning to work directing SYDNEY TO THE MAX made her selfish for wanting a career alongside motherhood.
Seven years later, Fishel’s outlook sounds like a woman who has made peace with the tension between those two callings — not by eliminating the guilt entirely, but by learning to sort her own feelings from her children’s needs before she reacts. It’s a small shift with real weight behind it: the parents who pause first tend to raise kids who feel less like targets of frustration and more like people worth understanding.
Fishel welcomed Adler in June 2019 and Keaton in August 2021, according to PEOPLE.
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