Prince Harry has opened up about reconnecting with Diana years after her loss. The Duke of Sussex appeared on the American education platform MasterClass, in an episode titled Redefining Grief: Building Resilience Through Loss.
In the open conversation, Harry spoke about grief and growing up with the trauma of losing his mother, as well as a battle with depression later in life. He also talked about adulthood and his family life now.
The video sees Harry, 42, share that a therapist encouraged him to open up about his grief surrounding the loss of Diana. He revealed that he hasn’t cried in almost 20 years after his mother’s death and thinks about her “pretty much every night and then most mornings”.
He added that his therapist urged him to find Diana’s perfume to unlock memories of her after he admitted to forgetting his voice.
Harry said the smell brought back floods of emotions and memories he had suppressed for a long time.
He said: “It was like being transported to another time.
“It unlocked everything that was locked.
“Sprinkling my mother’s scent was almost like knocking down different bricks so that I could go through and different memories and experiences could start to come back.”
In the very personal episode, Harry added: “Everything I do, everything I put my energy into, I hope my mum will be proud of.
“Trying to continue and protect her legacy, what I didn’t realize was that the work I was drawn to was so similar to the work she did.”
The interview comes just weeks after the publication of Earl Spencer’s memoir about Diana, which ignited tensions between Harry’s uncle and the king when it claimed Charles had “forgotten” his former wife.
Harry continued to reflect on Diana’s death.
He said: “I did not cry when I was told my mother had died, only at her funeral, and then not again for almost two decades.
“I was convinced that was strength, but it wasn’t. It was a 12-year-old boy with no permission to fall apart and no roadmap to heal.
“I spent so long emotionally numb because I felt disloyal and guilty about the possibility of being happy without her. I felt I had to stay sad and shut down emotionally to prove I missed her.”
He added that therapy helped change that perspective, saying, “The reality is that what I discovered is that she just wanted me to be happy.
“That was a huge mental shift for me. It freed me and gave me a completely different outlook on life.”