Ireti Doyle Speaks for the Very First Time About Her Divorce from Patrick Doyle

Ireti Doyle and Patrick Doyle are one of Nigeria's most popular couples but for a long time now, there have been conflicting reports about the state of their relationship. Some people say they're separated, some say they're still together, some say they're divorced. Through it all, Ireti Doyle has kept her mouth silent about it all. Until now.

During a new interview with Chude, the Nollywood actress finally opened up about her divorce, yes divorce, from ex-husband Patrick Doyle. Here is everything Ireti Doyle revealed during the interview.

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"[People have speculated and written articles about you and Patrick Doyle's marriage but when you click on them, there is nothing because you have said nothing about it]. Is there still an Uncle Patrick and you? What is happening? We don't see you together, we don't see you talking about that? What's happening?"

IRETI DOYLE: We're officially divorced.

"Right. Is there reason why you didn't engage any of the speculation about it?"

IRETI DOYLE: Do you see me talking about my personal life in public? That's nobody's business, you're not entitled to that. That I am an actor and I apply my trade in the public arena does not make you entitled to my personal life. And quite frankly, I don't owe anybody any explanation. So go ahead, speculate all you want, if it helps you digest your morning tea, I'm happy to oblige.

"But you know why people will be interested"

IRETI DOYLE: No, I don't know why. Tell me.

"Because we love love stories. That's why we go and watch Cinderella over and over, and people like me grew up watching you two together. So people have seen this beautiful picture for years and suddenly, they don't. So first there is a dissonance, but more importantly, I think people live their lives vicariously through celebrities. I think that is the fascination."

IRETI DOYLE: Which is such a shame because my life is not an animation. I'm sorry if I contributed to shattering your image of love and the perfect couple, but my life is not an animation, and I cannot sacrifice my life at the altar of your imagination or your fantasy. So if I hurt anybody I'm sorry, but I had to choose me. I'll say it was a pretty picture, and there was a wide lampooner between the picture and reality, that's all I'm just gonna say.

"I don't want to push, but it's my job. You had to choose yourself, but was that for you, a painful decision?"

IRETI DOYLE: It was a difficult one. It was a difficult decision. I mean, we are Nigerians. You don't approach divorce easily. It's not a decision that you take casually, more so when your relationship is very public. It's not so much that we lived our lives out in the public per se, but we were pretty well known within our industry, and in the Nigerian society. You think about what people will say, what the church will say, what society will say, what my peers will say. You're busy thinking about all that so no, it wasn't an [easy] decision. I'm wired differently: if I make a fundamental choice, let me use this as an example - if I choose you as a friend, and bestow friendship upon you, and you do me dirty, I will make an excuse for you. Because I have chosen to bestow friendship upon you so therefore, there cannot be anything wrong with my judgement, so I'm going to make excuses for you. And when I can no longer make excuses for you, I'm still going to try and make this work. Why? Because I made a decision three years ago to bestow friendship upon you. It is after I've tried and tried, and in all this trying, you can still feel yourself still being bent out of shape trying to accommodate this person, it takes a while for me to now say I've tried. I always want to be able to look myself in the mirror and say I gave it my best shot. It wasn't something I approached easily, there were too many moving parts. But at the end of the day, hopefully you will arrive at a place in your life where you just have to be 100 percent honest with yourself. In spite of everything that has happened, I still have respect for the person. I might not like them very much but I still have respect for the person, the years that were spent there, and the child that was born. There are children that are involved who are young adults in their own right, who have had some of their illusions shattered. And I am not going to go a step further by shattering them some more by being careless with my words because a partner upset me or did not meet my expectations, or I feel I was taken advantage of. That's all I'm gonna say.

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