This World Mental Health Day we are encouraged to consider the impact of being able to speak openly about internal struggles. Though it may seem that those who have access to privilege, power, or influence are immune to ill mental health, members of the British royal family have proved with their candour on the subject of therapy that this is certainly not the case.
From Meghan Markle's frank discussion of her own mental health struggles in her Netflix documentary Harry & Meghan to the Princess of Wales' discussion of talking openly about your feelings through her work with Prince William on Heads Together, many royals have shed light on the importance of removing the element of taboo from talking about mental health and going to therapy.
Meet the British royals who have used their platform to speak openly about therapy…
Prince Harry
© Samir HusseinThe Duke of Sussex has never shied away from discussions of mental health, even in terms of his difficult experiences as a working royal. Since moving to California, the Prince has spoken more explicitly about going into therapy.
LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman told Harry on the Masters of Scale podcast: "As a born and raised Californian, we would tell jokes. 'Hey, my therapist will talk to your therapist,' as a way of building a connection. I'm aware that that is a very Californian perspective," to which Prince Harry wholeheartedly agreed.
© Getty"You're absolutely right, Reid, about the cultural differences, they're immense," Harry replied. "You talk about it here in California, 'I'll get my therapist to call your therapist.' Whereas in the U.K. it's like, 'Therapist? What therapist? Whose therapist? I don't have a therapist. No, I definitely don't, I've never spoken to a therapist'."
During a 2017 episode of Bryony Gordon's Mad World podcast, Harry admitted: "I have probably been very close to a complete breakdown on numerous occasions when all sorts of grief and all sorts of lies and misconceptions and everything are coming to you from every angle," he said.
He revealed that it was his brother Prince William who encouraged him to seek help after Harry confessed to "shutting down all of his emotions for the last 20 years" after his mother tragically passed away in 1997.
© Antony Jones/Julian ParkerThe father of two has since spoken about the impact therapy has had on him. "The experience I have had is that once you start talking about it, you realise that you're part of quite a big club," Harry said. "I can't encourage people enough to just have the conversation because you will be surprised firstly, how much support you get and secondly, how many people are literally longing for you to come out."
Much like his support from William, Harry has also revealed how his relationship with his wife encouraged him to seek help. In his new Apple TV+ docuseries with Oprah Winfrey, The Me You Can't See, Harry said: "I saw GPs. I saw doctors. I saw therapists. I saw alternative therapists. I saw all sorts of people, but it was meeting and being with Meghan. I knew that if I didn’t do the therapy and fix myself, that I was going to lose this woman who I could see spending the rest of my life with."
Meghan Markle
© Samir HusseinMeghan Markle has perhaps been the most open about her mental health struggles. In 2020, she wrote an emotional letter for the New York Times, revealing that she had suffered a miscarriage in July and talking about her feelings became more important than ever.
"Sitting in a hospital watching my husband's heart break as he tried to hold the shattered pieces of mine, I realised that the only way to begin to heal is to first ask, 'Are you OK?'," the Duchess penned.
© Getty"Losing a child means carrying an almost unbearable grief, experienced by many but talked about by few. Some have bravely shared their stories; they have opened the door, knowing that when one person speaks truth, it gives license for all of us to do the same."
© WPA PoolShe has also championed journaling as a form of self-expression and therapy. "It allows me to reflect on where I've come from," the mother of two said on an episode of the Teenager Therapy podcast.
"With that comes a lot of perspective," she continued. "I think that most of us can all connect with the idea that sometimes when you're going through something it feels like the biggest thing in the entire world. I think when you look back at it in a year and yeah, it was still big, it wasn’t that big, comparatively."
The Princess of Wales
© WPA PoolTogether with Harry and William, Kate launched Heads Together in 2016 as a campaign to reduce stigma around mental health.
On the subject, the mother of three said: "We have seen that two heads are better than one when dealing with a mental health problem…Mental health is how we feel and think. Things that can’t really be seen, but that affect us every day and talking about them can feel difficult… Sometimes, it’s just a simple conversation that can make things better."
© GettyThe Princess also spoke about the importance of young people having access to someone they can talk to about their feelings in an essay penned in support of Mind's Time to Change campaign. "I feel strongly that young people and parents need to know that they can ask for help," Kate wrote. "Just as with physical health, we need to act early to provide support when a child is faced with emotional difficulties."
In 2023, the doting mother urged a group of children to "keep talking about your feelings" when she marked the start of Children's Mental Health Week by joining pupils from St John's Church of England Primary School in Bethnal Green for a craft lesson.
© GettyKate has been more private with her mental health, however, she did open up about the isolation she felt when she lived in Anglesey after marrying William in 2011. During a later visit to the Ely and Caerau Children’s Centre in Cardiff, Kate revealed: "I had just had George and William was still working with search and rescue, so we came up here when George was a tiny, tiny little baby, in the middle of Anglesey.
"It was so isolated, so cut off, I didn't have my family around me, he was doing night shifts, so if only I'd had a centre like this at a certain time."
Prince William
© WPA PoolKate's husband shares her sentiment about the importance of seeking help for mental health issues. Speaking about his time as an air ambulance pilot, the Prince of Wales said: "I took a lot home without realising it. You see many sad things every day that you think life is like that. You're always dealing with despair and sadness and injury. The attrition builds up and you never really have the opportunity to offload anything if you're not careful."
Princess Diana
© GettyThe late Princess Diana was one of the first royals to speak about therapy openly. In her BBC Panorama interview in 1995, she discussed seeking help for postpartum depression, bulimia and marital problems. "Maybe I was the first person ever to be in this family who ever had depression or was ever openly tearful," she said. "And obviously that was daunting, because if you've never seen it before how do you support it?"
She went on: "I received a great deal of treatment, but I knew in myself that actually what I needed was space and time to adapt to all the different roles that had come my way. I knew I could do it, but I needed people to be patient and give me the space to do it."
King Charles
© WPA PoolRoyal reporter and author Sally Bedell Smith reported that King Charles attended therapy for 14 years after seeking help in the early years of his marriage. Allegedly, Prince Charles appeared "misunderstood and starved of natural affection".
More recently, the monarch has confirmed that the government plans to reform the Mental Health Act so that it is "fit for the 21st century".
Sarah Ferguson
© Ken McKay/ITV/ShutterstockIn 2021 the Duchess of York spoke exclusively to HELLO! about how childhood abandonment issues, coupled with years of enduring hurtful headlines from sections of the tabloid press, led her to seek therapy, something she has continued for over two decades.
"I did have and still have mental health issues, which I work at literally every day, I really do, and I have been in therapy for 24 years," the mother of two said. "Sometimes I talk to my therapist on a weekly basis, and then sometimes, when it gets really tough, I jump in and get a quick hit of trying to understand the negativity of the demons of my mind."
Princess Margaret
© GettyDISCOVER: Exclusive: Mental health campaigner praises Prince William and Princess Kate's 'empathy' on subject
Princess Margaret reportedly sought help following her divorce from Antony Armstrong-Jones in the 1970s. The Princess never publicly spoke about her struggles or going to therapy, but it was depicted on Netflix series, The Crown.
