Gavin Rossdale and Gwen Stefani's divorce was anything but a sweet escape.
In fact, the Bush frontman recently recalled the pain he felt over not living up to the ideal he had of marriage.
"My parents were both married three times each—so very colorful background," Rossdale said on the March 20 episode of Amy Robach and T.J. Holmes' podcast Amy and T.J. "And so I never thought I'd ever get divorced. So if there's a simple shame in my life, it's that."
Still, he said he believes there are "no accidents in life" and that he doesn't question if things could have worked out differently.
"Life just unfolds how it should," the singer added. "And whether that's comfortable or uncomfortable, it just is what it is. It's an easier philosophy to live by ‘cause it means you don't sit in regret."
However, Rossdale—who shares kids Kingston, 17; Zuma, 15, and Apollo, 10, with Stefani—admitted there is one thing he would like to change about where the exes stand.
"It'd be nice if there was sort of more connection with the person who made them with me. So that side of it," he continued. "So, I feel bad for my kids, that's it. That's the overriding thing."
"The rest of it is, like, it comes with the territory," Rossdale added, "and there's been sort of other things….If I could be the most honest, that would be the most profound thing of, like, wish I could have just figured out a way to not have that in their lives."
After all, the 58-year-old could relate to these challenges.
"It wasn't fun for me to be from a broken home," he shared. "I think in a way it gave me a career. So I don't mind ‘cause I turned it around to sort of an interesting career path. But it can be quite debilitating for kids."
Rossdale—who is also dad to daughter Daisy Lowe, 35, from a previous relationship—and Stefani broke up in 2015 after nearly 13 years of marriage. The No Doubt star has since married Blake Shelton, and the "Love Remains the Same" artist noted he'll still attend his kids' events even if the couple is there.
"I go to a lot of events where there's the other team, so to speak," he said, "and I just feel really proud of myself in my consistency as a father. I know in my heart that I'm super consistent. Yeah, of course, like everyone I'm flawed as hell and things didn't go as perfect as I would have liked."
Even when he's away from the kids on tour, he continued, "there's an intrinsic bond that's so strong and so present that I have a lot of pride in that. It's unwavering."
Another thing Rossdale indicated is unwavering? His desire to not speak negatively about Stefani after their split.
"It's not my place to saying anything," he said. "I'm handcuffed because I would never want to overly say anything negative about their mom or stuff like that. It's just not right."
And ultimately, Rossdale has suggested he and Stefani just keep their lives—including how they raise their kids—separate.
"I think you can go one of two ways," he said on a June episode of Adrianna Costa's podcast Not So Hollywood. "You can either do everything together and really co-parent and see how that goes, or you can just parent. And I think we just parent."