Prince Harry Says That Meghan Markle ‘Saved’ Him From The Royal Family In New ‘Real Time Therapy Session’ With Gabor Maté
March 6, 2023 by Marissa Matozzo
Prince Harry just sat down for an intimate interview and book event with Hungarian-Canadian physician and author Dr. Gabor Maté, and revealed that Meghan Markle “saved” him from the royal family.
The Spare author, 38, joined Maté, 79— an expert who specializes in trauma, addiction, stress and childhood development— for a virtual live conversation that aired over the weekend. In the Duke of Sussex’s interview, he also dished that he always felt like an outsider within his family dynamic growing up, among other notable takeaways.
READ MORE: Prince Harry Reportedly ‘Out For Revenge’ As Spare’s ‘Fierce, Vengeful Attacks’ Make It A Bestseller
Harry and Maté, author of The Myth of Normal: Trauma, Illness, and Healing in a Toxic Culture, discussed living with loss and grief and prioritizing personal healing. As People Magazine reports, Harry mentioned how he could relate to his mother Princess Diana, as she also felt like she didn’t “fit in” with the rest of the royal family.
“Certainly throughout my life, throughout my younger years, I always felt slightly different to the rest of my family,” he said. “I felt strange being in this container, and I know that my mum felt the same. It makes sense to me — it didn’t make sense at the time — I felt as though my body was in there, but my head was out, but sometimes it was vice-versa. The times that I ventured towards being myself, being my authentic true self, whether it was through media or family or whatever it was, it was almost like, ‘Don’t be yourself, come back to what you’re expected to be,’ if that makes sense.”
Another memorable point Harry made was that he believes his wife Markle, 41, was instrumental to his healing and made him feel more comfortable in expressing his feelings than other family members had before.
“My wife saved me,” he said. “I was stuck in this world, and she was from a different world and helped draw me out of that. But none of the elements of my life now would have been possible without me seeing it for myself.” He gushed, “My partner is an exceptional human being, and I’m eternally grateful for the wisdom and the space that she has been able to give me.”
The former royal also said that writing his successful 2023 memoir Spare was crucial to his healing journey. “I really hope, and I hoped right from the beginning, when I turned around to the people that were helping me write this book, I said, ‘I want this to be an act of service, it needs to be, because I know important it is, because you’re almost giving permission for people to talk about their own stuff, and be their own selves, and society doesn’t really help us,” Harry told Maté. He went on, “And I would say even more so within my family, because of the expectations and because of how you’re cast as individuals.”
Regarding his time in therapy, Harry said, “A lot of families are complicated, a lot of families are dysfunctional, but for me when I was doing therapy regularly… I felt that I learned a new language.” He stressed that other members of the royal family “didn’t speak that language,” and he added, “This is working for me and I’m starting to go back to the point of trauma and unpack everything so I can be truly happy… but at the same time I’m feeling more and more distant from my loved ones and my family.”