Prince Harry reflects on losing his mother Diana and encourages youth to 'talk about' grief in heartfelt video
LONDON, UK: In a heartfelt new video, Prince Harry addresses the importance of discussing grief, particularly among children and young people.
Speaking as a global ambassador for Scotty’s Little Soldiers, an organization supporting children who have lost parents in the military, Harry shared his personal experiences and insights following the loss of his mother, Princess Diana, when he was just 12 years old.
Prince Harry speaks on grief and loss
“It’s so easy as a kid to think or convince yourself, you convince yourself that the person you’ve lost wants you, or you need to be sad for as long as possible to prove to them that they are missed. But then there’s this realization of, no, they must want me to be happy,” he reflects. [sic]
Prince Harry, aged 39, has openly discussed the lack of support he experienced following his mother's tragic death in 1997. He attributes this to bottling up his emotions for years, eventually prompting him to seek therapy.
He also underscores the challenges children encounter when discussing their grief.
“That’s the hardest thing, especially for kids, I think, which is, 'I don’t want to talk about it because it will make me sad.' But once realizing that if I do talk about it, I’m celebrating their life, then actually, things become easier as opposed to this 'I’m just not going to talk about it, and that’s the best form of coping,' when in fact it’s not. It can be for a period of time, you can’t suppress it forever. It’s not sustainable. And will eat away at you inside,” he said.
The video, recorded in May during Harry’s last visit to the UK, captures a poignant conversation between the prince and Nikki Scott, founder of Scotty’s Little Soldiers.
Scott recounts the harrowing moment she had to inform her five-year-old son, Kai, that his father, Corporal Lee Scott, who served with the 2nd Royal Tank Regiment, had been killed in Afghanistan in 2009. At the time, she also had a seven-month-old daughter, Brooke.
Prince Harry comforts grieving mom in heartfelt video for military charity
Prince Harry shows his support for Scotty's Little Soldiers, a charity dedicated to helping bereaved military children.
Released on June 26, the video features an emotional conversation between the Duke of Sussex and Nikki Scott, the charity's founder, just before Armed Forces Day in the UK. This annual event, celebrated on the last Saturday in June, honors the military community, including active personnel, veterans, cadets, and service families.
The video, titled 'From Grief to Growth,' depicts Scott recounting the heartbreaking day in July 2009 when she learned of her husband, Corporal Lee Scott's death in Afghanistan.
At that time, their son, Kai, was just 5 years old, and their daughter, Brooke, was 7 months old. Sitting across from Prince Harry, Scott tearfully shared, “It was the worst. How do you tell a 5-year-old this? Because I literally just shattered his world. He knew that life was never ever going to be the same.”
"It sounds so corny, but I started to think, 'How many other children have had a parent who's died?'" Scott said during the meeting, as the Duke of Sussex interjected, "There's nothing corny about that."
