Prince Harry says suppressing grief affected his memories of Diana

Prince Harry said that, in the years after his mother’s death, he tried not to think about her and found he could no longer recall some of his happiest memories of her. Speaking to neuroscientist Mary-Frances O’Connor in a MasterClass lesson released on Thursday, he said he had forgotten Diana’s voice and laugh and struggled to picture her without looking at a photograph, according to Nieuws.nl. [1]

Harry said he did not cry when he was told his mother had died in 1997. He cried at her funeral, he said, but then did not cry again for almost 20 years. He had regarded that response as strength, though he later came to see it differently.

He also described how a therapist encouraged him to find his mother’s perfume. Smelling it felt, he said, like being taken back to another time. Harry said therapy helped him feel able to grieve. He had once felt guilty about being happy, he added, but came to believe his mother would have wanted happiness for him. [1]