Garber grew up in Miami, the youngest of three children of a Lawyer father and a cooking-school owner mother. She did some modeling from ages 4 to 13, and always wanted to be a performer. Garber told TV Guide in 1987 that she chose acting over singing because "I was too nervous to sing in front of people—it meant showing more of myself than acting. If you're on stage singing and people don't like it, that's too much rejection." She later moved to New York, where her Casual drug use became what she called "a huge problem". She overcame the addiction before being cast in North and South.