NICOLE & KEITH: OUR COUNTRY STRONG MARRIAGE

After more than a decade of highs and lows together, Kidman and Urban share secrets of their unique — and enduring — union

How Kidman and Urban have managed to keep their 12-year marriage intact through the highs and lows.

Keith Urban needed rescuing. Back in 2006, the country superstar had lost control of his addiction for the third time. “I’m an alcoholic, it’s just the way I’m wired,” the Aussie recently told the U.K.’s The Standard. “My brother isn’t, I am. My mother isn’t, my dad was. Luck of the draw.” But some good luck was coming his way, too: wife Nicole Kidman. Just four months into their marriage, the actress checked her husband into the Betty Ford Center in California for a 90-day rehab program. “It was just time — I’d exhausted every loophole,” he recalls. “I was ready. But she was [also] the right person at the right time. It was meant to be.”

Through 12 years of marriage, the couple have proven time and again that they are, indeed, meant to be. “Meeting her and getting married wasn’t life-changing,” the American Idol judge, 51, has said of the Oscar winner, also 51. “It was life-beginning. It was literally like, ‘Okay, life starts.’” It hasn’t been easy: Two thriving careers mean they’re often apart, and they’ve faced countless rumors about marital problems. But through it all, they’ve made sure their romance remains a top priority. Urban often flies home to their Nashville spread after a concert — but he’ll leave Kidman love notes just in case he

doesn’t make it back that night. And when the Big Little Lies star takes on a new project, they hit the road as a family, even hiring an on-the-go tutor for their daughters, Sunday,

10, and Faith, 7. “We can almost always relocate,” explains Urban. “We just make the rhythm work so we can be together.”

HEALTHY BALANCE

For the A-list duo, their professional lives are left at the door of their four-bedroom, 35-acre Tennessee mansion. “Obviously I work hard, but when I’m off, I’m off,” Kidman recently told Harper’s Bazaar U.K. “Keith and I are very good at immediately clicking off because we have a really good life in Nashville.” To establish that “simple, quiet and nourishing” atmosphere, Kidman says they set down a few ground rules. “I used to have an office in my house and I just got rid of it — it’s the best thing I’ve ever done,” says the Boy Erased actress. “I finally went, ‘This is not a good thing.’ We don’t have a TV in our bedroom; we’re that couple. I highly recommend that. And no computers in bed.”

After all, the bedroom is a, er, sacred place — which Urban sings about in his recent hit “Gemini”: “She’s a maniac in the bed but a brainiac in the head... she’ll wake you to make love in the middle of the night.” Though once shy to share details of their intimate affairs — “I wouldn’t have been sure it felt right coming out of my mouth,” he’s said — the musician now doesn’t hold back. “If I feel that way about her, what’s the problem?” Urban has admitted, calling the song “a simple, fun, sexy-arse song about my wife.”

THE RIGHT NOTES

Music plays a key role in their family life. Sunday and Faith “sing a lot,” Urban tells Us. “They’re always singing in the car or around the house. They’re both musical.” But Kidman — who also has two children, Isabella, 25, and Connor, 23, with ex-husband Tom Cruise — admits it’s still too early to say whether they’ll follow in Dad’s footsteps: “When I say, ‘What are you going to be when you grow up?’ they roll their eyes, which is the perfect response.”

Career paths aside, the “You’ll Think of Me” singer has one hope for his girls: that they grow up to be like their mom. “People ask me, ‘How do you do it?’” he gushes. “I say, ‘It’s Nic.’ She’s got all of us so incredibly taken care of. She’s amazing.”