Divorce rates are on the rise in Ireland. Is it time to make it a less punishing process?

As divorce rates continue to steadily rise in Ireland, Ellie O’Byrne asks if it is time to make more provision for a less punishing process.

Combined figures for judicial separations and divorces between 2015 and 2021 chart a more measured 5% increase in applications.

Receiving her divorce papers is a moment that Bernadette Tuite says lives with her as a surreal rite of passage, a moment that reduced years of tangled human experience down to a dry legal document.

“Suddenly, there was a divorce decree in my hand. This piece of paper didn’t feel like it had any correlation to what had happened. It was so surreal. This great love, this person that you thought you were on the Yellow Brick Road with for life, is just a name printed on a piece of paper. Suddenly, that’s all that’s left.”