Being born in Northern Ireland is special when it comes to identity, we get to chose how we define ourselves and both the Irish and UK governments agreed to respect these choices. The Good Friday agreement helped bring about peace in Northern Ireland and that choice of identity is something revered by many. I identify as Irish and hold an Irish passport. I married my American partner in July 2015. We decided to make Belfast our home and proceeded to apply to the UK home office for the spouse of an Irish national visa.

This was refused on the grounds that as I was born in Northern Ireland I am in fact British. To proceed I would first need to declare I'm British and then renounce that citizenship and during this entire process and the appeals procedure they'd be holding onto my husbands passport, it's been just under two years so far. Sadly we've been hearing from more and more couples who have found themselves in the same situation. We are appealing this case and asking as many people as possible to sign our petition and raise awareness to this issue.