Wedded bliss no more for Ieremia

The fairytale marriage of former TVNZ sports presenter April Ieremia is over.

Married in 2002, Ieremia, 38, and husband Andrew Bruce - who runs award-winning bar The Whiskey in Auckland - have parted company this month after seven years together.

The couple have two children, 3-year-old Atlanta and 2-year-old Xanda.

Ieremia refused to go into the reasons behind the breakup, but a close friend said the former Silver Fern was saddened and disappointed by the split.

She also didn't want to discuss what had caused the pair to break up, but it is believed to be far from amicable with suggestions of one other party involved.

Ieremia has now dropped the name Bruce and reverted to her maiden name.

"There are always two sides to every story," said her friend. April doesn't want to go into it publicly though.

"She has her two children to think about. There's lots of rumours out there and most are completely wrong."

It is believed the marriage has been on shaky ground for some time.

Adding to the speculation was a photograph that appeared in the Herald on Sunday last week of Ieremia and an unidentified man.

However, the friend said that Ieremia was not involved with anyone else, and that she was concentrating all her efforts on her fulltime job of being a mother to her two young children.

Ieremia and Bruce met in 1999 and wed in a star-studded ceremony attended by Julie Christie, Judy Bailey, Richard Long and Annie Crummer in the Cook Islands in 2002. In an interview with a women's magazine at the time, Ieremia said: "I've always believed in the institution of marriage."

Since then, the couple has been regular fodder for women's magazines, with Ieremia chronicling her weight loss battles and problems with post-natal depression.