Moms on 'Dancing With the Stars': 'Put Your Kids First'
Kate Gosselin, Pamela Anderson and Niecy Nash balance motherhood with training.
April 5, 2010— -- The tens of millions of viewers set to tune into the third week of "Dancing With the Stars" tonight include some children whose moms are competing on the show.
What's it like for a famous mother to raise kids and raise the roof on national television? "GMA" special correspondent and former "Dancing With the Stars" contestant Cameron Mathison talked to Pamela Anderson, mother of two, Niecy Nash, mother of three, and Kate Gosselin, mother of eight, to find out.
Anderson, Gosselin and Nash all share the pressures of juggling their "Dancing With the Stars" schedules, while off-camera, raising kids as divorced moms.
"It's definitely a challenge," Gosselin said. "It's a good challenge. This is organizational skills to the max!"
Gosselin became a household name starring in a cable reality TV show with her eight children -- twins and sextuplets.
Her ex-husband, Jon, helps watch their kids in Pennsylvania while she competes on "Dancing With the Stars" in Los Angeles.
But even when Gosselin is home, rehearsing in her basement, she wishes she could spend more time with her children.
"I miss them, regardless," she said. "One day this week during practice I had a little meltdown while we were dancing. And I heard them upstairs. And I just started crying. And I was like, 'I just miss my kids.'"
Pamela Anderson can relate.
"I drop my kids off at school, I go straight to rehearsal and then I pick them up right after rehearsal," she said. "So, juggling everything has been, you know, it's been a challenge, but you always put your kids first and then everything else falls into place."
Moms on 'Dancing With the Stars' Find Balance
Anderson says she doesn't think of herself as a sex symbol. "I think of myself as more of a mom, I guess," she said.
A protective mom, when it comes to the privacy of her 12-and 13-year old sons. She refuses to have their photos publicized.
"I just don't think that they need to be in the spotlight unless they decide to later on in life," she said.
Single mom Niecy Nash claims raising her 18-year old son and two daughters -- 15 and 10 years old -- is tougher than being a mom to toddlers.
"I disagree with the notion that somehow my kids can take care of themselves because they're older," she said. "They can't. The truth of the matter is, it's easier when they're younger because you don't require much: something to eat, a popsicle for a snack, and a nap. But talk about when your children are faced with choices and decisions in life, in love, in trying to navigate their hormones. Who they're going to hang around, trying to see them clear through graduation, all of those things are far harder than, you know, a snack and a nap."
Gosselin isn't ready to think about the teenage years yet.
"I don't want to hear about it," she joked. "I just want to do today."
The biggest misconception about her, she said, is "that I'm using my kids for fame and fortune. That just does me in."
Appearing on "Dancing With the Stars" is a job, she said. And like any other working mom, she struggles to find a balance.
"I hate being away from my kids," she said. "If it could all go away because I was financially set andI could stay home and I could bake and cook from scratch, like I love to do, I'd so be there. But the reality is moms have to work. I'm not the only mom. Moms everywhere have to work, especially single moms. And I have to do this for my kids and I'm doing it to better their future because I love them more than anything."
Watch "Dancing With the Stars" Mondays and Tuesdays at 8 p.m. ET on ABC.