Gwen Stefani was given a "second chance at life" when she met Blake Shelton.

The No Doubt star was left broken-hearted following the breakdown of her 12-year marriage to rocker Gavin Rossdale - the father of her three sons - but she found happiness again when she was introduced to country singer Blake while they were working on 'The Voice' together.

She told the Guardian newspaper: "Meeting my husband [ Blake Shelton] felt like a second chance at life, because when my family fell apart, it was a catastrophe.

"How do you pick yourself up from that? But God put this other person there to love me."

Gwen and Blake went on to marry in 2021 and the pop star penned their duet 'Purple Irises' about their blooming romance.

She added: "I know this sounds weird, but Blake and I came together in gardening. We have a house together in Oklahoma and during the pandemic we came across this very old building on the land and there were some purple irises, which someone must have planted centuries ago, but they’ve survived.

"I wrote the song 'Purple Irises' about that and how it feels to find true love and the insecurities of not wanting to lose it."

It comes after Gwen revealed her childhood "dream" was to be married and she felt crushed by her divorce.

She told People magazine: "Something that I wanted since I was a little girl is to be married and have this love that I saw my parents have and have babies. "That dream was completely ruined; it was crushed, and I had to figure out how I was going to move forward and make a new dream, and God putting Blake in my life was just that miracle."

Gwen confessed her spilt from Bush frontman Gavin was made even more painful as she had hoped to imitate the "perfect example" of love set by her parents.

The ‘Don’t Speak’ hitmaker - who has sons Kingston, 18, Zuma, 16, and Apollo, 10, with her former husband - added: "Especially growing up with this perfect example of love between my parents. They met when they were 15, and they fell in love, and then they had us (children), and they made us feel like we were everything to them.

"And when you have a family and it's the opposite of that, it breaks up ... I didn't know what to do or how to protect my children. And I'm still working on that."