Who Is Mark Wahlberg’s Wife Rhea Durham? Meet His Spouse

Behind every successful man is a strong woman — and that’s who Rhea Durham is to her husband, Mark Wahlberg. The Ted star appreciates his spouse so much that he credited her for everything good that has ever happened in his life.

“I owe a lot to my wife,” he sweetly gushed to The Sun in August 2018. “She has helped me become the man that I am and created a beautiful life for me and our children.”

The pair are proud parents to their four kids — Ella, Michael, Brendan and Grace. When they’re at home, they like to do a bunch of fun activities together, including making TikTok videos. Needless to say, Mark and Rhea get along very well.

“I knew that she loved me for who I am and that she was someone I could trust. Until I met her, I wasn’t ready to have a family,” the Lone Survivor candidly explained. “You need the right woman in your life and that feeling that you’re going to be together for a long time.”

Mark noted his feelings for Rhea intensified when they decided to start a family. “That’s especially important if you’re going to have children. Rhea always wanted to be a mother. She had a job, but her mission in life was to be a mother and to be a wife,” he marveled.

It’s a good thing the model and her hubby were on the same page. Before they got married in 2009, they knew they already established an unbreakable bond. “We share the same values,” Mark said. “Obviously, the physical attraction was there, but that’s not what keeps a couple together.”

After more than 10 years together, he revealed the secret to their successful marriage during a June 2015 interview with Us Weekly. “Spend quality time together,” the actor gushed. “Really, that’s what matters.”

The pair celebrated their 12-year wedding anniversary with a cute couple’s snap posted on Instagram in August 2021. And while their relationship has been full of romance, the Ted actor admitted that he made one hilarious mistake on Valentine’s Day in 2022. The couple initially decided they were not going to celebrate the holiday.

“I’ll send flowers from each child leading up to Valentine’s Day. All four kids and then a big bouquet from myself,” Mark shared on Jimmy Kimmel Live in February 2022. “This year, she was like, ‘Let’s not do anything. Let’s not get anything for each other for Valentine’s Day.’”

While the plan was to keep it simple, Mark woke up with three gifts and a card from Rhea. He tried to come up with a plan on the fly, but it didn’t end up panning out.

“Then I made a reservation for dinner, and she was like, ‘No, let’s just go another time,’ and then, of course, I got in trouble for saying ‘OK’ to that too,” the Academy Award nominee said with a smile on his face. “I got the 4:30 reservations. I can make it seem like I rented the whole place out because nobody’s there yet. But it didn’t work out.”

Scroll below to learn five fun facts about Mark’s wife, Rhea!

Rhea Met Mark in the Big Apple

“We met in New York City, while I was doing a press junket. I asked her if she wanted to come out with me, and she said yes,” Mark told People in August 2010. “Then I asked her if she wanted to come to church with me the next morning, and she said yes again. So that was our first date: St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York. I knew shortly after that she was the one, but I still had to make sure that I was able to be the man I needed to be.”

She Helped Mark Believe in Love

After Mark got his heart broken at an early age, he stopped believing in true love. But all that changed once he met Rhea.

“I was a very nice guy early on. The first time I fell in love, and when I was in jail, she denied me, she didn’t want to wait for me. I don’t want to blame her now, but my heart was broken and I decided, ‘I’m never giving my heart to a girl anymore.’ Everything, but not that,” he told Red Bulletin in 2013. “And I ended up hurting a lot of people along the way. It was not until I met my wife and we had our daughter that I went, ‘Oh my God, this is happening for a reason.’ So now I have the utmost respect for women and teach my boys that. They shall not take the path that daddy took.”

Thursdays Are for Date Night

You don’t have to tell Mark and Rhea that every couple needs some alone time! “Every Thursday. We’ll leave the house in the late afternoon and go to an early movie or just hang out somewhere. Then we’ll go to dinner and catch up. But even when we go out, we like to get home to put the kids to bed,” Mark told Redbook in February 2012.