Gwen Stefani tried to 'fix' marriage when she first realised it was crumbling

Gwen Stefani desperately tried to fix her broken marriage when she first realised there were big cracks in her 13-year union.

The No Doubt star, who has documented the heartbreak of her split from Gavin Rossdale in the lyrics of her new songs, has revealed she knew the marriage was in trouble in February, 2015.

"It was devastating," she told PrideSource. "I didn't know what to do. It was a real big secret. I tried everything to fix it."

And she thanks her now two-year-old son, Apollo, for giving her the strength to get through the worst few months of her life.

"I had already started on a spiritual journey when I got pregnant with Apollo," Gwen explains. "That was sort of like, 'Wow, really? I'm gonna be blessed with a baby... now?' That was a miracle. It just started me on this spiritual journey, and thank God it started then, because I was prepared when I had the tragedy. I had that nest of spirituality in me."

But the singer admits she felt like she had failed at marriage when she looked at her own parents.

"My whole life, all I wanted to do was be a mother and a wife, and I had the dream of having this family because that's what I had," she says. "I have parents who've been married since high school, who are in love, and they're still in love... I had a perfect example, so it's super tragic for me. My dreams are shattered and I feel so embarrassed about what happened."

She has since found love again with country star Blake Shelton, and now she admits she's happy to talk about her marriage split in the hope her experience can help others: "It's so therapeutic to talk about it... and I hope it saves some other lives," she adds.