Donnie Wahlberg Wife Jenny McCarthy: The Love Story That Started with a Nibbled Ear and Never Slowed Down

Last updated on April 22, 2026

Donnie Wahlberg recalled an absolutely unbelievably cinematic moment. Sometime in early 2013 he was sleeping on a pillow next to Jenny McCarthy during a live broadcast of her VH1 talk show which she described as a groundbreaking interview. The two had only met once on Andy Cohen’s Watch What Happens Live the year prior. Cohen had encouraged Wahlberg to ask McCarthy out but Wahlberg had declined. But there was something unusual about that second meeting. McCarthy saw it herself when she watched the video again years later It was like we’d been married for six years she remarked. There was no chemistry done. It was simply present.

That’s perhaps the most accurate way to describe what Donnie Wahlberg and Jenny McCarthy have created together something that appears on the surface to be almost shockingly simple. more than ten vow renewals. Flowers every Monday for more than ten years. They use FaceTime so frequently that when one of them is traveling they end up dozing off on video together. It might be interpreted as a show similar to the public dedication celebrities put on for publicity. It’s difficult to become cynical after delving into the specifics of their tale.

Before Wahlberg entered the spotlight Jenny McCarthy born Jennifer Ann McCarthy in Chicago in 1972 had already had a prominent public life. She presented MTV’s Singled Out posed for Playboy in 1993 won Playmate of the Year and had a successful career in movies and television shows including BASEketball Scream 3 and Two and a Half Men. Her previous marriage to director John Mallory Asher had a kid named Evan who was diagnosed with autism in 2005. This experience had a profound impact on her writing and public campaigning outside of the entertainment industry. She was a lady who had already created something genuine intricate and unique by the time she actually met Wahlberg.

Wahlberg wasn’t exactly an unknown quantity either. The younger brother of Mark Wahlberg a founding member of New Kids on the Block at the age of fifteen and a quietly acclaimed character actor he shed forty three pounds by eating steamed cabbage in order to play a haunted man in The Sixth Sense. He later played Detective Danny Reagan on CBS’s Blue Bloods for many years. He had two boys from his prior marriage to Kimberly Fey Xavier and Elijah. In other words two individuals with complete histories and no special obligation to make anyone happy.

They became official in July 2013 made their red carpet debut at a Dancing with the Stars charity event in St. Charles Illinois in August of the same year and in a detail that seems almost staged were married at the Hotel Baker nearly exactly a year later. Edelweiss from The Sound of Music a tune Wahlberg had never heard till McCarthy played it for him one evening early in their relationship was the music for their first dance. It was not intended to be their wedding song. They simply took possession of it.

The proposal itself is noteworthy since Wahlberg showed up with the ring and wearing a shirt that said Me? while McCarthy’s son Evan entered with handmade cards that said Will You and Marry (spelled incorrectly she noticed with compassion). After McCarthy accepted Evan took the microphone and declared I have another dad. Everyone in the room including the couple reportedly started crying at that point.

Since then the marriage has developed in a way that doesn’t receive enough recognition in celebrity coverage a kind of happy grounded steadiness. In St. Charles Illinois McCarthy’s home state they relocated from New York City to a five bedroom Tudor with a golf green a pool with a grotto and waterfall and a tiny private nature trail with a Buddha statue and fountain. Together they founded a production company. They produced Donnie Loves Jenny an A&E reality series that aired for three seasons. One of the best things they ever did according to McCarthy was to attend couples counseling before they had their first argument.

Of course there are flaws. Wahlberg snores are one of them and McCarthy has been open about it. Not softly. She talked about building what she termed a Great Wall of China out of cushions wearing enormous headphones that played sounds of ocean waves every night and occasionally still being able to hear him over it all. She stated on Live with Kelly and Mark He started snoring right when I started perimenopause. This timing is either very bad luck or a very good test of a relationship. Apparently she passed.

During the 2026 iHeartRadio Awards the pair discussed how their date evenings have changed to include takeaway and watching episodes of the faith based drama series The Chosen together on the couch. McCarthy seems to be really happy about it. The fact that we’ve got some 50 year olds in the house still being asked to present is not too shabby she laughed. The fact that a night in watching TV and ordering food is still regarded as a good date by both of them after more than ten years may be the most revealing aspect of this marriage rather than the extravagant gestures like the vow renewals the birthday tributes that are hundreds of words long and the Monday flowers.

In his most recent birthday celebration Wahlberg referred to McCarthy as his soul mate sister in faith home screen queen and ride or die. That kind of terminology is simple to roll your eyes at. However when you recall the 2013 pillow scene on a VH1 studio with a child holding homemade signs and two people slow dancing to a song that one of them had never heard before it begins to feel less like a performance and more like something that was bound to happen.