Prince Harry has always had a complicated relationship with life as a royal — and that was especially true after the death of his mother, Princess Diana.
The Duke of Sussex, 41, discussed his feelings about life in the royal family while speaking at a charity event in Melbourne, Australia, on Thursday, April 16. Harry began the event with a 19-minute keynote address on mental health and grief where he said there were “many times” he’d felt “overwhelmed.”
“Times when I’ve felt lost, betrayed or completely powerless. Times when the pressure — externally and internally — felt constant,” he said, per PA Media. “And times when, despite everything going on, I still had to show up pretending everything was OK, so as not to let anyone down.”
After his address, Harry spoke with businessman and former politician Brendan Nelson and explained that he wasn’t exactly thrilled about royal life after his mother died at age 36 “just before my 13th birthday” in August 1997.
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“I was like, ‘I don’t want this job. I don’t want this role — wherever this is headed, I don’t like it,’” he recalled. “It killed my mum and I was very much against it, and I stuck my head in the sand for years and years.”
Harry went on to explain that he came around to his position by thinking about what his mother would have wanted him to do.
“Eventually I realized, ‘Well, hang on, if there was somebody else in this position, how would they be making the most of this platform and this ability and the resources that come with it to make a difference in the world?’” he said. “And that really changed my own perspective.”
Diana died from injuries sustained in a car crash in Paris while she and her then-boyfriend, Dodi Fayed, were fleeing the paparazzi. Harry later became an outspoken critic of the relentless media scrutiny faced by members of the royal family, especially since he and his wife, Meghan Markle, stepped down as senior working royals in 2020.
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Speaking on Thursday, Harry said that becoming a husband and father helped ground him. (He and Meghan, 44, share son Prince Archie, 6, and daughter Princess Lilibet, 4.)
“When a parent is overwhelmed, children feel it. When someone is supported, families feel it,” he said, per PA Media. “For me, one of the biggest shifts came when I realized that asking for help isn’t a weakness. It’s very much a form of strength.”
Harry has previously opened up about how he struggled to accept his mother’s passing, believing for years that she might have faked her death and would eventually reunite with him and his brother, Prince William.
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“For a long time, I just refused to accept that she was gone,” he said during a 60 Minutes interview in 2023. “You know, she would never do this to us, but also, maybe this is all part of a plan.”
At age 20, Harry asked to see the police report about the crash, which included photos of his mother after the incident. His private secretary cautioned him against looking at all of them, and he heeded the advice.
“All I saw was the back of my mum’s head, slumped on the back seat,” Harry recalled. “There were other more gruesome photographs, but I will be eternally grateful to him for denying me the ability to inflict pain on myself by seeing that. Because that’s the kinda stuff that sticks in your mind forever.”
