LONDON – Prince Harry reportedly revealed he has long felt "slightly different" to 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, 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 III, and brother William.
"I certainly have felt throughout my life, my younger years, I felt slightly different to the rest of my family," Harry told 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.
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, Mate – the author of several books on trauma, addiction and illness – publicly diagnosed 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, Mate said there was "a lot of trauma and suffering".
California-based Harry, who quit the UK and royal life with Meghan 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 Meghan they were trying to learn "from our own past and overlapping those mistakes, perhaps, and growing to break that cycle".
In his memoir, 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 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 Harry claims elder brother William attacked him during an argument about Meghan – is said to have significantly worsened relations between the self-exiled couple and other senior royals.
It remains unclear whether they will attend Charles' landmark coronation in early May. – AFP, March 5, 2023
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