Prince Harry says always felt 'different' from other UK royals

Prince Harry credited his wife Meghan Markle for having “saved” him. PHOTO: REUTERS

LONDON - Prince Harry reportedly revealed he has long felt “slightly different” from the rest of Britain’s royal family in an interview on Saturday with a trauma expert.

In a wide-ranging discussion with Dr Gabor Mate, Prince Harry, 38, described himself as coming from a “broken home” and said he was trying not to pass “trauma” onto his children, according to reports of the live-streamed conversation.

The interview follows the January publication of the Prince’s controversial memoir, “Spare”, in which he admitted his adolescence was marked by drugs and alcohol and detailed the breakdown in his relationships with father King Charles, and brother, Prince William.

“I certainly have felt throughout my life, my younger years, I felt slightly different from the rest of my family,” Prince Harry told Dr Mate, according to numerous media reports on the interview.

“I felt strange being in this container, and I know that my mum felt the same so it makes sense to me,” he added, referring to his late mother, Princess Diana.

Prince Harry went on to credit his wife Meghan Markle for having “saved” him.

“I was stuck in this world, and she was from a different world and helped draw me out of that,” he said, describing her as “an exceptional human being”.

During the conversation, Dr Mate – the author of several books on trauma, addiction and illness – publicly diagnosed Prince Harry with attention deficit disorder (ADD).

Summarising the prince’s life, which has included losing his mother at the age of 12 and later serving with Britain’s armed forces in Afghanistan, Dr Mate said there was “a lot of trauma and suffering”.

California-based Prince Harry, who quit the United Kingdom and royal life with his wife in 2020 amid a rift with the monarchy, opened up about his parenting style towards their two children, three-year-old Archie and one-year-old Lilibet.

“I feel a huge responsibility not to pass on any trauma or negative experiences that I’ve had as a kid or as a man growing up,” he said.

“There are times when I catch myself when I should be smothering them with that love but I might not be.”

He added that together with his wife, they were trying to learn “from our own past and overlapping those mistakes, perhaps, and growing to break that cycle”.

In his memoir, Prince Harry acknowledges using cannabis regularly earlier in life, and cocaine on several occasions when he was a teenager, saying he was “willing to try almost anything that would alter the pre-established order”.

He reiterated to Dr Mate that cocaine “didn’t do anything for me” but said marijuana was “different”.

“That actually really did help me,” he said, according to Britain’s Press Association.

The publication of Spare – in which Prince Harry claims elder brother Prince William attacked him during an argument about Markle – is said to have significantly worsened relations between the self-exiled couple and other senior royals.

On Sunday, a spokesman for the couple told Britain’s Sunday Times that they had been invited to King Charles III’s landmark coronation on May 6 but have yet to decide whether to attend.

They “recently received email correspondence from His Majesty’s office regarding the coronation”, a spokesman said. “An immediate decision on whether the Duke and Duchess [of Sussex] will attend will not be disclosed by us at this time,” their representative added, using their formal titles.

Buckingham Palace declined to comment.

Charles, who ascended to the throne upon his mother’s passing, will be formally crowned king in a pomp-filled ceremony to be attended by dignitaries from around the world and watched by billions.

The celebrations will feature a star-studded concert, nationwide “big lunch” and volunteering initiative, as well as the traditional ceremony and royal processions.

The main May 6 coronation day also happens to be Archie’s fourth birthday. AFP

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