Not everyone will meet their true love on set, be able to go out on spontaneous day
trips, or enjoy elaborate, separate dressing rooms, but at its core, love is the same for
everyone.
Marrying young can sometimes be a big mistake, but time has proven that certain matches are
just meant to be.
Model Ashley Graham met her now-husband, filmmaker Justin Ervin, at church in 2009 when both
of them were only 21 years old.
They got married the next year, and have been going strong ever since, but things almost
ended before they began.
As Graham wrote in an essay for Glamour, she was turned off when Ervin wanted to split
the check on their first date.
They got past it, and went steady a few months later.
The couple now has three young kids: Isaac, and twins Malachi and Roman.
Along the way, they've also weathered some serious issues; Graham recalled the reaction
of her racist grandmother, who initially did not want to get to know Ervin.
However, they persist due to open communication and a lot of hard work.
Graham told Bazaar Bride that the couple never goes to bed mad at each other.
Setting joint objectives is also important for the duo, who like to approach goal-setting
in a creative way.
She told People Now,
"Every year, every two years, we'll make a new vision board.
Also, on our anniversaries, we kind of do, like, an analysis of where we are."
Many couples recognize the benefits of having designated "date nights," but smart ones also
understand the value of having alone time away from one's partner.
Take Faith Hill and Tim McGraw, who are clearly doing something right after three decades
of marriage.
When working and traveling together on their Soul2Soul World Tour, the couple was clear
to set boundaries so that they each had their own space and time to refresh in solitude.
In 2018, Hill told People,
"We both have our daily routines and we have our own dressing rooms.
We each have our own space to retreat to so we do get time to ourselves."
The couple met in 1994, when both were in other relationships.
They toured together two years later, and the sparks were so strong that they left their
partners.
They got engaged and married that same year and went on to welcome three daughters together.
While separate closets and the need for full-on dressing areas for each partner isn't exactly
typical of most households, this mindset is just the touring musician's version of having
a "man cave" or a "she shed."
It's also a smart strategy — experts suggest that alone time can benefit a marriage, which
The New York Times called "the gift of time apart."
Clearly, Hill and McGraw have set a pattern that works, given how much time they spend
together.
In 2022, McGraw told USA Today that they spend 98% of their time in each other's company.
"I looked at her and was smitten right away."
We're so used to celebrities who court media attention that it doesn't even phase us anymore
when a star duo puts their relationship out there for all of the world to see.
But a lot of our favorite celebrity couples are actually very private about their partnerships
and home lives, which is even harder to do when both partners are mega-famous.
But somehow, Sarah Jessica Parker and Matthew Broderick have managed to shield their marriage
from the public eye.
In 2014, Parker told The Huffington Post,
"The secret is, we don't discuss it.
To reporters or anybody else.
That's it!
We don't hold it up as an example and we don't air our dirty laundry."
And it's true that Parker and Broderick have long avoided public scrutiny by limiting the
amount of information they share.
The couple met in 1991 and got married six years later, and they've never been about
the spotlight.
Parker told Harper's Bazaar,
"Matthew and I come from a different time and place.
When we were young people, all we ever wanted was to be good working actors.
[...] So when our marriage came up in conversation, it wouldn't occur to us that we were obligated
to respond to allegations or gossip."
Pink met her husband, former pro motorcyclist Cary Hart, in 2001, and their early years
were full of ups and downs.
They split in 2003, only to reunite a year later, and marry two years after that.
Then, in February 2008, the couple announced their separation, before the tragic death
of Hart's brother brought them back together, at which point they decided to work on things.
That recommitment to each other certainly paid off, because the couple has been together
ever since, and have built a family together, welcoming their daughter Willow in June 2011,
and their son Jameson in December 2016.
In 2021, Pink told Extra that she and Hart do not see divorce as an option, saying,
"There's no quit button.
Unless we find one.
Right now, we don't have one."
Key to the couple's commitment is their respective upbringings, as both grew up with divorced
parents.
Pink continued,
"We love being a family.
And we both come from families that gave up, and that's okay.
That was their journey, that was the journey we all were supposed to be on.
But for us, we don't want to do that."
The singer also credits counseling sessions with helping her and Hart to get on the same
page.
In a 2021 Instagram post celebrating her anniversary with Hart, she wrote,
"What a wild ride it's been, once we learned how to stay in our race line."
Busy couples rarely get to spend as much time together as they like, so the importance of
that limited couple time is amplified.
This is something actor Boris Kodjoe knows, and something he keeps in mind when he's with
his wife, Nicole Ari Parker.
Kodjoe has said that he makes it a point to focus solely on his wife and to make sure
she knows how beautiful he thinks she is, telling Essence,
"Guys have to be more present.
When the wife walks in, it should be an event.
You have to look up, you have to close the computer, and you have to say, 'Hey baby,
wow!'"
Kodjoe and Parker have been married since 2005, and they have a busy life juggling their
careers and two teenage children.
In 2022, Kodjoe told Ebony that they swear by spontaneous kisses and surprise day trips,
amongst other things.
When Kodjoe was featured in People's "Sexiest Man Alive" issue in 2022, he detailed what
a surprise date looks like, telling them,
"I gave my wife a sound bath for her last birthday.
I had a lounge singer in our front yard serenade her and a chef cook her a meal on the terrace."
A massage, manicure, pedicure, and henna rounded out the day.
It's pretty fancy stuff, though Kodjoe has emphasized the importance of staying grounded.
"Celebrities are people.
They're humans, just like you and I."
There is nothing sexy about sleeping in a different room than your spouse, but sometimes
it's a necessity.
Whether it's differing schedules or a severe snoring problem, The New York Times detailed
a 2023 study of 2200 Americans which found that one in five couples sleep in separate
rooms.
Count Carson Daly and his wife among that 20% of couples.
Daly met his wife Siri Pinter when she worked on his show, Last Call With Carson Daly, and
they married in 2015.
They have four children, so neither of them is probably sleeping that well anyway, but
at least they're doing what they can to minimize the damage.
They began sleeping apart, which Daly has jokingly called "sleep divorce", when Siri
was pregnant with baby number four.
Daly told People,
"She was in her third trimester, and I also have sleep apnea.
She couldn't get comfortable, so we were like a commercial you would see, kicking each other
and just not sleeping."
They stuck with the plan after the baby was born, and in 2022, he told Today that they
still often sleep apart.
Kit Harington never got to show his sense of humor on Game of Thrones, but we caught
glimpses of it when he hosted Saturday Night Live in April 2019.
While we're still waiting for Harington to star in a comedy, he practices by putting
his funny bone to work at home.
Harington is such a fan of practical jokes that he once pranked his wife so badly that
she forbade him from ever doing it again.
So, what did he do?
Harington hid a very realistic fake head in their fridge.
Harington is married to Rose Leslie, who played his Wildling love interest Ygritte on Game
of Thrones.
The pair fell in love in 2011 while filming Season 2 in Iceland, and briefly broke up
in 2013 before getting back on track, marrying five years later.
That infamous prank Harington pulled actually occurred prior to the marriage, and while
it was not bad enough for Leslie to call things off, she may have been tempted.
Harington told The Jonathan Ross Show,
"She pretty much told me if I ever did it again that would be it, and I think that's
marriage included."
"She was in tears, and I was there going, 'April Fools.'"
We weren't entirely sold on Priyanka Chopra Jonas and Nick Jonas as a couple when we first
heard about them.
For one thing, Chopra Jonas is 10 years older than her husband, and at 25, Jonas seemed
a bit too young to settle down.
The purity ring had come off and Jonas had become a full-blown sex symbol, so going the
playboy bachelor route for a while seemed like a sure thing.
Chopra Jonas had the same idea when Jonas slipped into her DMs in 2016, telling Today,
"I didn't give it much of a chance because I was like, 'He's 25 years old, he's a rockstar.
I want to get married, I want to settle down, I want to have a baby.'
I was 35 at the time."
Regarding their age difference, she continued,
"I mean, I don't think about it.
I think people think about it a lot more than I do."
In May 2018, the pair were officially dating, and by July of that year, they were engaged.
They married in India five months later and quickly became a model married celebrity couple.
With their thriving careers, the pressures of fame, and a young daughter at home, the
Jonases live a chaotic life.
Like many couples, they have to coordinate their schedules to maintain order — although
they do it differently than most, likely with their full team of assistants.
Hugh Jackman met Deborra-Lee Furness in 1995, and immediately knew he wanted to wife her
up.
Jackman told Today,
"I knew two weeks in to meeting Deb that we were going to be together for the rest of
our lives."
Still, a relationship does not last for decades without hard work and dedication, which are
two things the couple has exhibited.
They share two kids, and have established some strict rules to help keep their marriage
healthy.
This isn't just normal to do, but something therapists would recommend for many couples.
Jackman and Furness married only 11 months after they first met on a production, which
gave them plenty of time to adjust to married life before he skyrocketed to fame playing
Wolverine in 2000's X-Men.
Those rules no doubt became even more important as things got busier, and they're all relatively
common-sense directives that any couple can abide by.
Per an interview that Jackman did with Irish Mirror, two of the most important ones are
never spending more than two weeks apart and always being 100% honest.
They don't let tension linger, either.
Jackman continued on Today,
"Sometimes it's 3 o'clock in the morning, but we kind of work it out before we go to
sleep."
"In the end, what do you want from your life partner?
You want to be fully seen, and you want to be able to fully see them for exactly who
you really are."
Flirting with your spouse is good for any relationship, but it's probably even easier
when your spouse is Eric Decker.
So, how does the equally attractive Jessie James Decker work to keep things frisky and
fun in their marriage?
The Deckers began their romance in 2011 after Jessie's friend texted her about this, quote,
"stunning" man her boyfriend showed up with for dinner, and subsequently set them up.
They married in June 2013 and their reality series, Eric & Jessie began a few months later.
Three kids and a decade later, the duo is still going strong — proof that there may
be something to the country singer's strategy, which has helped them avoid the reality TV
marriage curse.
Jessie told People,
"Besides being super attracted to each other, I think there's a sense of flirting with each
other and still keeping that spice alive."
Angela Bassett has done just about everything; graduate from Yale University, sustain a decades-long
Hollywood career, and maintain one of the most enviable marriages in Hollywood, given
how long it's lasted and how private her family's affairs have remained.
Bassett first met Courtney B. Vance when both were students at the Yale School of Drama,
but they didn't keep in touch or cross paths again until 1994.
They got married three years later and welcomed twins Bronwyn and Slater at the start of 2006.
Communication and understanding have been key to helping the couple go the distance,
and Vance had a very interesting analogy for their marriage when People interviewed him
in 2023, revealing,
"Talking, communicating, and allowing each other to have your own space, and then come
back together.
It's like a rock band.
[...] We're better together and stronger together."
The meeting of Megan Trainor and Daryl Sabara was probably a little unusual.
"I was at a songwriter, Hollywood party, and he crashed it with two of his friends.
And I was like, 'SPY KIDS IS HERE!'"
That might not be too typical, but there's a relatability to Trainor's confession that
she and her husband use the bathroom in front of one another.
The fact of many marriages is that joint bathrooms sometimes necessitate it.
But in typical celebrity fashion, there are abnormalities to this story since most of
us don't construct two side-by-side toilets to hold hands while urinating.
As Meghan revealed on Nicole Byer's "Why Won't You Date Me" podcast,
"In our bathroom, there was one toilet, and a lot of time in the middle of the night when
we're with the baby, we've got to pee at the same time.
So I was like, 'Can we please have two toilets next to each other?'"
It's unknown why two adjacent bathrooms were not an option.
Meghab's brother Ryan Trainor, was also a guest on the podcast and delighted in calling
Meghan and Sabara weirdos for their bathroom habits, including her penchant for going number
two in front of her hubby.
There's something so ordinary about Mark Consuelos and Kelly Ripa, even though they're unbelievably
rich and famous.
It may be their relationship that makes them seem like one of us, since they clearly love
each other and have no problem oversharing the details with fans.
The pair have discussed their sex life so often that there are entire articles about
their private escapades.
They clearly have an intense chemistry and an experimental, active sex life, which is
a real feat after decades of married life.
Consuelos is also open about his jealousy.
It's not necessarily a good trait to have, but it's relatable because so many people
struggle with the same emotion when in a relationship.
In an episode of her "Let's Talk Off Camera" podcast, Ripa admitted that her hubby's jealousy
was a big issue early in their marriage, telling a story about Consuelos getting mad over her
flirtations with an elderly Italian waiter just a week into their marriage.
In the same episode, Consuelos added,
"If this is any consolation, you know you're being crazy.
The jealous person knows that this is wrong and it's ugly, but they can't help it.
[...] I wanted to do some work on myself and that was one of the major things that I needed
to work on because it was getting in the way."
Ryan Reynolds is one of Hollywood's most affable gents, but he had a hard time finding the
right woman to sign on to a lifetime's worth of his quirky sense of humor.
He dated plenty of celebrities, including Alanis Morrissette and Kristen Johnson, before
marrying Scarlett Johannson in 2007.
After only two years they divorced, but the end of their marriage opened up the space
for him to meet his true soulmate, Blake Lively.
With Lively, Reynolds found someone who was not only up for dealing with his unique sense
of humor, but who matched it with her own.
Reynolds and Lively have lovingly trolled each other online so much that there are now
dozens of articles chronicling the timeline of their best takedowns.
This has made diehard fans of the couple, who became friends after meeting on the set
of Green Lantern, but didn't start dating for a year.
They wed in 2012.
Four years later, during an appearance on The Jess Cagle Show, Lively explained about
Reynolds,
"In everyday life he is my friend first, and I think that's the secret to happiness."
Reynolds has made similar statements, once telling Extra,
"We really like each other.
We really liked each other before as friends beforehand.
We like each other even more so now."
It's really easy to think that all celebrities are super social creatures who are always
on the go, gallivanting from party to party.
So, it might be surprising to learn that actor Salma Hayek and her husband Francois-Henri
Pinault barely have a social life outside of one another.
It's not like they have no money, since Pinault is the CEO of fashion corporation Kering and
worth approximately 7 billion.
And we suspect that Hayek has no issues making friends.
It's as simple as the couple preferring to spend time alone.
Hayek told reporters at a Harper's Bazaar event in 2017,
"I married the right guy.
That is probably the most important thing.
We support each other in everything we do.
We want the other one to strive.
Makes you happy when the other one strives.
And you know what, we don't have a very strong social life, because we really like to spend
time together.
So we do spend a lot of quality time together."
The two met in 2006 and within a year, they were engaged and pregnant.
They've been married since February 2009 and have yet to tire of each other, despite their
constant togetherness.