Prince Harry admitted that he felt out of sync during the first stage of his journey as a father.
“Certainly I felt a disconnection because my wife [Meghan Markle] was the one creating life, and I was there to witness it,” Harry, 41, shared during a Movember event in Melbourne on Wednesday, April 15, describing the emotional gap he experienced after welcoming son Prince Archie, 6, with Meghan, 44, in May 2019.
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s first child was born in London, and they are now proud parents of two. (Meghan gave birth to daughter Princess Lilbet, 4, at Santa Barbara Cottage Hospital in June 2021.)
Harry was an open book about his vulnerable moments during his trip to Australia with Meghan, telling Movember’s global director of men’s health research, Dr. Zac Seidler, how he turned to therapy in order to be the greatest parent he could be.
“Certainly, from a therapy standpoint, you want to be the best version of yourself for your kids. And I knew that I had stuff from the past that I needed to deal with and therefore, prepare myself to basically cleanse myself of the past,” Harry candidly shared. “I think the biggest tip that I was given from my therapist in the U.K. was just be aware of how you feel once the baby is born.”
Harry said “our kids are our upgrade” while talking about his legacy, revealing he’s taken a different strategy with his children rather than how he was raised in the royal family. (Harry and Meghan stepped back from their duties as senior working royals in 2020 and relocated to Montecito where they are raising their two kids.)
“That’s not how I was taught, but that was my take on it — not to say I was an upgrade of my dad or that my kids are an upgrade of me,” he continued during the event held at the headquarters of the Western Bulldogs football club. “That’s the approach that I take, to know that with the world the way that it goes, the kids that we bring up in today’s world need to be an upgrade.”
Harry and his wife left their kids at home this time around, but he and Meghan were able to bring back two small Bulldogs jerseys personalized with their names.
Before her trip Down Under, Meghan shared a rare video of Archie and Lilibet enjoying Easter festivities at their mansion in Montecito. In the clip, which showed the siblings running around their garden looking for Easter eggs, Lilibet got in the holiday spirit by wearing pink bunny ears.
