  Laurie Gelman, left, and Catherine Marion host The Mom Show, which will be taping at the St. Laurent Shopping Centre.
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A sheepish Laurie Gelman says she's sorry for the third time.
The Ottawa-born mother of two, who flies between New York City and Toronto each week to shoot Slice network's The Mom Show, laid down for a quick nap and ended up sleeping through a scheduled interview time.
"I just want to apologize for yesterday," she tells Sun Media. "But that sleep was so good!"
As any mother of young kids can attest, delicious afternoon naps can be desperately sought but pretty hard to come by.
For Gelman, who leaves her husband and two daughters each Monday morning and returns late Wednesday afternoon after shooting eight shows back-to-back, they are just as rare.
But like other working mothers, Gelman loves her job but says she feels "horrible guilt" about the time she spends away from her children.
"It's so hard because you make sure never to miss anything important. And you're there for every moment that you can be, but there's still those times when they look at you and they don't understand why you can't pick them up from school or you can't go to this birthday party with them," she says.
Like a lot of working mothers, Gelman doesn't think she has the patience to stay home with her kids full-time.
"I think I'm a better mom because I work, I come home, I'm happy, I'm focused on them," she says.
Gelman is spending three months this summer shooting the third season of The Mom Show. She co-hosts with Ottawa native and Rogers Daytime alum Catherine Marion . The pair will be back in town when the show travels to the St. Laurent Centre to shoot on location July 5 and 6, and Gelman says she's constantly inspired by stories from the real moms who appear on it.
"Every woman worries about being a good mother, every mom worries about being a good wife as well," she says.
"You all worry that you're not doing a good job, that you're going to screw up your kids and they're going to be in therapy because of you."
Gelman is married to Regis and Kelly executive producer Michael Gelman. The pair live on the Upper West Side with daughters Jamie, 6, and Misha, 3.
After studying mass communication at Carleton University, she landed a job as a host at YTV, quickly moving on to Miami where she became an entertainment reporter.
Gelman was assigned to interview Regis Philbin before his gig as the grand marshal of the Ft. Lauderdale Boat Parade. She also interviewed her future husband, and the pair were hooked from the first time they talked.
Four months of long-distance dating ensued before Gelman landed at job as a host at the fledgling FX network's Breakfast Time with Tom Bergeron. The reaction when she called Gelman -- the thoughtful, cautious type -- was less than enthusiastic.
"There was this dead silence on the other end and he said, 'Well, you're not moving up here for me, are you?' " laughs Gelman. "He seriously said that. I thought, 'Sweep me off my feet you silver-tongued devil.' I thought, 'No jerk-face, I'm doing it for the six-figure salary!' "
Seven years later they married and she continued to work in the U.S., serving as a part-time pop culture reporter for CBS when she had her girls.
After interviewing everyone from Tom Cruise to Madonna over the years, Gelman says she doesn't miss celebrity reporting and is particularly glad she's not in the business now.
"In 1992, I was the only game in town back then. I was the only entertainment reporter in Miami," she said. "It's insane now. I don't know what's happened in entertainment. I think it's disgusting. There's such a blur between news and entertainment."
Though Slice has shown a good commitment to The Mom Show, Gelman is looking ahead to writing for the Web or magazines as a second career.
"I'm 43. In TV years that's like 107," she says. "Since I'm not Barbara Walters, and I haven't established myself on a huge basis, my days are numbered. I'm lucky The Mom Show hired me."
To book seats for the St. Laurent Centre shows, e-mail themomshowottawa@slice.ca.
