From Miss Guatemala to Motherhood: An On the Porch Exclusive With Bakersfield News Anchor Gabriela Rosales
Four TimeEmmy Winner Gabriela Rosales Opens Up About Motherhood, Grief, Gratitude, Co-Parenting, and the Strength It Takes to Keep Showing Up
By Kathleen Hokit, Published on May 10, 2026 | Feature Photo Credit: Kern Media LLC
There’s a quiet kind of strength that doesn’t always announce itself.
Sometimes it looks like getting up before dawn after a near-sleepless night. Sometimes it looks like showing up for your children while carrying heartbreak no one else can see. And sometimes, it looks like stepping in front of a live television camera with grace, even during the hardest season of your life.
For Emmy Award-winning journalist, morning weather and news anchor with KGET-17’s 17News@Sunrise, and former Miss World Guatemala Gabriela Rosales, strength has never been about pretending life is perfect.
“I think people misunderstand strength,” Rosales says. “They think strength means not crying. I think I’ve been my strongest through tears.”
This Mother’s Day, her story is not simply one of television success or pageant titles. It’s a story about resilience, motherhood, gratitude, and learning how to move forward when life changes unexpectedly.
A Childhood Lived Across Borders
Gabriela Rosales at age 4, holding her baby brother
Born in Guatemala and raised around the world, Rosales grew up surrounded by history, culture, and diplomacy. Her father served as a colonel in the Guatemalan Air Force before later becoming a diplomat, eventually serving as Guatemala’s ambassador to El Salvador.
Gabriela Rosales with her Father
Her mother, a businesswoman, ran a rejuvenation clinic and instilled in her daughters a philosophy of being “beautiful inside and out.”
Gabriela Rosales with her Mother
Rosales’ childhood unfolded across multiple countries—Guatemala, El Salvador, Panama, Washington, D.C., and later Mexico. Without fully realizing it at the time, she witnessed defining global moments while simply living life alongside her family.
“We were in Panama when Noriega was taken,” she recalls. “We were in Washington, D.C., during the Oliver North trial. I got to live little pieces of history.”
Those experiences quietly shaped the woman she would become—curious, observant, and deeply aware of the human stories unfolding around her.
A Stage Was Always Calling
Long before pageants or television, there was theater.
“I remember loving theater since I was 13 and 14,” she says about her first real time on a stage.
Still, despite a childhood spent moving between embassies and capitals, she considered herself extremely shy. The diplomatic world had quietly shaped her—sharpening her ability to read a room, listen, observe—but it hadn’t pulled her out of her own reserve.
That changed at 19, when a family friend pushed her to enter the Miss World Guatemala pageant. Her sister had competed before her. Her mother had mentioned it more than once. But Rosales had no real interest.
“I honestly never thought I would be in pageants,” she says. “I was more into wearing socks and tennis shoes, not into the dresses.”
She entered anyway. And something shifted almost immediately.
Courtesy of Gabriela Rosales
“It was like somebody opened up a gift,” she says. “That shyness just completely went away. It was like rediscovering myself.”
The pageant also introduced her to a sisterhood she still treasures three decades later.
This year marks 30 years since she represented Guatemala in 1996, and just two months ago, she reunited with Miss UK in Los Angeles after nearly three decades apart.
“I told her I feel chills—it was like we didn’t stop seeing each other,” she says. “It’s one of the times where you get to be with so many other girls in other cultures. There are no wars. You develop a lot of friendships.”
She remains in touch with Miss Mexico, Miss Dominican Republic, and Miss Brazil to this day.
If she could give one piece of advice to younger contestants, it would be this: wait.
“Prepare yourself and go into the pageant in the mid to oldest range, because it is a lot. You’re competing with girls who might be 23, 26.”
The Moment That Became a Career
Her path to broadcasting began not with a plan, but with a no-show.
While representing Guatemala, Rosales attended a charity event raising funds to provide medical equipment to a hospital and to support a girls’ home. The slogan of Miss World—beauty with a purpose—was the heart of the night. When the scheduled MC didn’t arrive, the 19-year-old was asked to step in.
Afterward, Julia Morley, chairwoman and CEO of the Miss World Organization, pulled her aside.
“She asked me, ‘Have you done this before?’ I said, no, it was my first time. She said, ‘You really should consider a career in this. You’re great.'”
She didn’t think much of it at the time. But soon, Guatemalan television stations began inviting former pageant contestants to co-host segments. The day Rosales arrived for hers, the producers asked her to stay.
Courtesy of Gabriela Rosales
What followed was a career that would span lifestyle, cultural, and entertainment programming, a beloved California travel show, and eventually a full transition into news reporting, weather anchoring, and meteorology.
In 2014, when she was offered a weather anchor position in Los Angeles, the contract came with an unexpected condition—she had to study meteorology, fully covered by the station.
“I just thought, what a great opportunity. This whole scientific part of weather just became beautiful.”
What an Emmy Really Means
Over the years, her work earned multiple Emmy nominations and wins, but today, she says the accomplishments that matter most aren’t necessarily the ones displayed on a shelf.
“When you finally hold that statue in your hands, it’s not just about one story,” she says. “It represents all the nights you didn’t sleep, the sacrifices, the work, the effort it took to get there.”
If she were to win another today, she says, it would mean something different entirely.
Courtesy of Gabriela Rosales
“It would signify the resilience through all the struggles. It would signify I’m able to see the sun and be happy again, where I wasn’t after my brother passed away. It would signify that I was able—as a mother—to go through all those moments, to sit through a newscast and not cry. That’s what that Emmy would mean.”
She also points to a quieter moment, early in her reporting career, that shaped how she approaches her work to this day. She had been sent to cover her first house fire.
“I just sat there thinking, to me, this is a story… but this is their life. They’re going to go to bed and they’re going to wake up and their house is still not going to be there.”
That perspective—that every story is somebody’s actual life—became the lens through which she’s worked ever since.
“We’re here to serve people. We’re only links,” she says. “When I’m doing an interview, when I’m doing a live shot, I always know it’s not about me. I am simply a link between the communication and the person that needs to get to the other side. My job is to facilitate that in the best way possible and to make the person right next to me shine.”
When Life Changed
Within less than two years, Rosales experienced the loss of her father, watched her mother lose her eyesight, lost her brother, began divorce proceedings while pregnant with her second son, and faced the start of a global pandemic.
Still, she continued showing up.
There were mornings when the weight of everything felt overwhelming, yet she remained committed to her work, her children, and moving forward one day at a time.
“I would cry while they put my makeup on,” she shares. “Then I would do the newscast. I don’t know how. Not a tear. I’d finish and then cry again afterward.”
She made it through, in part, because of the people around her.
Credit: Kern Media LLC
“I’ve always had the fortune of having people who are earth angels,” she says. “But that’s also what you put out and what you give to people.”
After COVID hit, when babysitters were nearly impossible to find, she sometimes brought both of her sons to the station. The makeup artist or hairstylist would sit in the car with them while she anchored the news.
But even in those moments, she says she learned something powerful about herself.
“This too shall pass,” she says. “When things are bad, they will pass. But when things are good, they’ll pass too. That gives you gratitude.”
Today, her perspective on life feels rooted less in achievement and more in appreciation. She speaks openly about choosing kindness over competition, humility over ego, and love over resentment.
She’s also careful with the word inspirational.
“I’m okay with the word inspirational, but more from a resilient side—more from the side of we are all human. We’re all going to go through things.”
That philosophy shapes how she counsels younger journalists too.
“Start humble and stay humble,” she says. “Everything passes. You never know who around you is going to be in what position one day. Even when you think you’ve gone to the top, somebody you don’t even notice might be way above you after. Maybe your news director. It might be an intern.”
On Co-Parenting and the Term “Single Mom”
She speaks gently—but firmly—about the language often used to describe women in her situation.
“I don’t like to use the term single mom when you are divorcing the father,” she says. “You have a co-parent.”
Co-parenting hasn’t always been easy, she admits, and the early years were the hardest.
“It’s not going to be because of me that this is not going to work,” she remembers deciding. “It took a while for both of us to put our best foot forward.”
Today, she says, the relationship is civil, cooperative, and centered on what’s best for the boys.
For women standing at the same crossroads she once did, her advice is layered, tender, and—she acknowledges—against the grain of much modern commentary.
“If you can save your marriage, save it,” she says. “I am extremely pro-marriage. I believe in love. I believe in marriage. If there is no abuse, and it’s something you can both put your pride aside for—then try to fix it. There’s always therapy. There’s always a conversation.”
She tells the story of a friend who had struggles in her marriage. The friend came to Rosales for advice.
“Most people would probably tell you, just leave him. You can do it on your own,” she says. “I told her—those people are not going to be there carrying your groceries. If you’re in love with the person, and it’s not abusive, give it a chance.”
For women already past the point of saving the marriage, her advice softens but holds steady.
“Breathe,” she says. “Make decisions from a place of love instead of anger. The other side is also hurt. If you can come from a place of love, at some point things are going to calm down.”
Motherhood at the Center
Above all else, Rosales speaks most passionately about motherhood.
Her two sons are at the center of her world, and nearly every part of her life now revolves around creating meaningful experiences with them.
“I turn everything into a teaching moment,” she says.
That can mean conversations during a drive, lessons pulled from current events, or family trips centered around history and culture rather than material things.
She’s taken her oldest son to see the Statue of Liberty, Independence Hall, and the Liberty Bell. In Los Angeles, she brought him to the La Brea Tar Pits to spark curiosity about science and prehistoric life.
“I just want to give them a wealth of knowledge,” she says. “I want them to see the world.”
Her oldest son already speaks four languages—Spanish, English, French, and a bit of German—a reflection of his multicultural upbringing, and he’s attended both French and German schools in Los Angeles.
But the urgency she feels about teaching her boys runs deeper than enrichment. With her father gone, her brother gone, and her mother’s vision and health declining in Guatemala, she sometimes feels like the last keeper of certain stories.
“I don’t know how long I’ll have the fortune to pass on this,” she says. “There’s no one else around me. So it’s like this constant need to pass on the knowledge.”
Even everyday moments matter to her.
She loves introducing her children to locally owned restaurants, teaching them gratitude, conversation, and how to appreciate experiences together as a family.
“It doesn’t have to be expensive,” she says. “Just meaningful.”
Bakersfield Was Already on Her Mind
That philosophy followed her to Kern County.
Less than a year ago, Rosales made the move to Bakersfield after feeling unexpectedly drawn to the community long before a job opportunity even appeared.
“Out of the blue, six months before coming to Bakersfield, Bakersfield gets into my brain,” she says. “I started telling my friends, ‘I’m thinking about Bakersfield.’ They were like, ‘That’s random.'”
Then a position opened. The interviews, she says, were unlike anything she’d experienced.
“Everything was so simple. It flowed. Like no other interview has ever flowed in my life.”
Courtesy of Gabriela Rosales
Now working as a morning weather and news anchor at the station, she describes the move as life-changing in the best possible way.
“Bakersfield has been chicken soup for my soul,” she says. “I finally have a sense of peace.”
Downtown Bakersfield, California. Credit: Matt Gush
She remembers walking out of the station early one morning and seeing a sunrise that stopped her.
“After all the struggles, after everything, all the turmoil, I finally have a sense of peace right now.”
She also lights up talking about the team she works with—including her younger co-anchors Lauren and Anthony, in their twenties, who she says teach her as much as anything she could offer them.
Gabriela Rosales with KGET TV – 17 co-anchors Lauren Holcomb and Anthony Vasquez
“I think I learn more from them than they do from me,” she says. “Lauren is only nine or ten years apart from my oldest son. It gives me this perspective—this is where my son will be in ten years.”
She also lights up talking about the simple things many residents often overlook—neighbors greeting each other, short commutes, a station led by people who deeply care about the community.
“You go to the store and people say hi,” she says. “You know your neighbors. There’s something really beautiful about that.”
Her oldest son noticed it too.
After attending highly regarded schools in Los Angeles, he recently told her Bakersfield had become his favorite place to go to school because, as he described it, “It feels normal.”
For Rosales, that moment meant everything.
After years spent navigating fast-paced cities, career pressure, and loss, normal suddenly felt beautiful.
A Mother’s Day Message
This Mother’s Day, Rosales has a message she hopes reaches the women who need it most—the ones smiling through pain, parenting through grief, or starting over when starting over feels impossible.
Healing does not happen overnight. Strength doesn’t always look polished. And sometimes the bravest thing a person can do is simply continue moving forward with grace.
For women facing heartbreak, uncertainty, or difficult transitions, her advice is rooted in compassion.
“Breathe,” she says. “Make decisions from a place of love instead of anger.”
Credit: Kern Media LLC
She also encourages women to hold onto hope, even when life feels impossibly heavy.
“You don’t see the light at the end of the tunnel at first,” she says. “But eventually, you realize you’re stronger than you thought.”
Today, viewers across Kern County wake up to Rosales’ warmth and positivity on their television screens each morning.
What they may not fully see is the journey behind that smile—the resilience, the gratitude, and the mother who chose, day after day, to keep moving forward.
That’s what makes her story so meaningful.
Not because life was easy.
But because she never stopped choosing joy anyway.
Kern Magazine’s Signature Questions
What Do You Love About Your Kern County Community?
“I love how friendly everyone is. You go to the store and everyone says hi. I know my neighbors. There’s a real sense of community here. And I love that people from here truly love Bakersfield.”
When You Eat Local, Where Do You Eat?
“Frugatti’s. I love the story behind it and everyone there is so friendly. I took my son there for his birthday and we’ve already gone back multiple times. The Theresa’s pasta is my favorite—it’s actually named after Theresa, who works there with her family.”
When You Want to Get Out of Town, Where Do You Love to Go?
“I really loved Tehachapi. Going there during Christmas felt magical—it was like visiting a grandma’s house, just beautiful. I want to explore more of the Central Coast too—Pismo Beach and Morro Bay are definitely on my list.”
Coming Soon
Gabriela Rosales was recently selected as the featured reporter for an upcoming national documentary that brings a Bakersfield story to a much wider audience. More details to come!
You can catch Rosales at KGET.com and through her continued work with Telemundo.
”It means so much to me to be able to collaborate with Telemundo and continue serving the community as a whole,” Rosales says.
