Gwen Stefani says she 'didn't want to fail' at marriage but with Gavin Rossdale it was 'extra hard'

Gwen Stefani, who is currently dating country singer Blake Shelton, has opened up about her highly publicised divorce from ex-husband Gavin Rossdale. In an interview with Glamour magazine, the Hollaback hitmaker revealed her marriage to the lead singer of Bush was "extra hard".

"I don't think you'll talk to one person who didn't make it in a marriage who's not gonna feel that way," the songstress said when asked why she kept using the word "embarrassed" to describe her divorce from Rossdale.

"The intention of being married is the vow, right? You want to put everything into it to make it a success. All I had to look at was the huge success of my parents: They just had their fiftieth anniversary."

The lead singer of No Doubt further said that her relationship with her former husband came with its set of challenges and issues, but she never want to see their relationship fail.

"[Marriage] was the one thing I didn't want to fail at," the 47-year-old singer said. "People can say whatever they want to about me...and I don't get too affected. But I didn't want them to think I was a failure. There's nothing weird about how I felt."

"I had to work really hard at marriage, all the time, like everybody, but ours was extra hard, when you add that we're from different countries, both of us being in music, and celebrity."

Despite undergoing a difficult split in August 2015, Stefani believes sometimes "you need to go through some really bad, hard times" to "be woken up again in life". "I feel like I got woken up this year."

Stefani and Rossdale were married for 13 years. The former couple share three sons - Kingston, 10, Zuma, 8, and two-year-old Apollo.