The longest marriages even have their fair share of challenges.
After all, nothing lasts long without proper tempering, growth, and nurturing.
Through these processes, the most important thing is how a couple works as a team – that even when the times get tough, they emerge from the other side stronger.
Donny Osmond has been in show business for six decades. And most of us know that this is an unforgiving industry.
For someone to last that long, there must be a secret.
Donny Osmond credits his success to his constant for 44 years.
Osmond and his wife Debbie first met in 1970.
He was just 16 back then and Debbie was 15.
Since the beginning, it seemed like they were meant for each other – a teen superstar and a cheerleader.
And even in vastly different lives, they managed to connect.
“There was something simple about her, and I lived a very complicated life,” he said in an interview with PEOPLE.
He fondly remembers the time when he was crazy famous.
He was only 12 when he got his solo debut and was catapulted into fame when his singles like “Puppy Love” and “Go Away Little Girl” became household hits.
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“I remember being chased a lot, mostly in England,” Osmond said in the interview.
“It was Osmondmania over there. Once we had to hide under a table in a restaurant because there were so many screaming fans rushing after us.”
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But in the end, there’s only one kind of attention that he yearned for. At one point, he cried his eyes out to his brother because he felt “lonely.”
Osmond then surprised his fans when he got engaged to Debbie.
He knew everything would be gone when he revealed his secret love story, and he was correct.
No more screaming fans, no more running from the mob, no more people calling his name.
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Osmond said he crashed and burned financially.
He lost it all. But there’s one important thing that he still has – Debbie.
He said that through his ups and downs, Debbie was his constant.
He shared that when he did Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, he was consumed by anxiety that it felt like dying.
It was the culmination of years of failure.
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“Debbie said, ‘Why don’t you go out there tonight and do an average show?’” he recalled to PEOPLE.
“It ended up being the best show I ever did because I gave myself an opportunity to make a mistake.”
Osmond performed Joseph over 2,000 times in a span of six years.
It was the foundation on which Osmond rebuilt himself as an artist. He’s now in Vegas and has since appeared in different reality shows.
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He and Debbie were also blessed with 12 beautiful grandchildren from their 5 children.
He also became an advocate for mental health because he saw himself in the same desperate and seemingly inescapable chapter.
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“I thought my career was going to be over at 20,” he said. “So I’m so glad I’m going to be able to end it on my terms.”
And it’s all thanks to the people who stayed with him, especially his childhood sweetheart Debbie.
Click the video below to learn more about their 44-year love story.
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