Prince Harry has starred in a new video about grief, urging children and young people to talk about their emotions.
The royal, who was speaking in his role as global ambassador for Scotty’s Little Soldiers, which supports young people who have lost parents in the military, shared his own vision after losing his mother, Diana, Princess of Wales, at just 12 years.
‘It’s so easy when you’re a child to think or convince yourself… you convince yourself that the person you’ve lost loves you, or you need to be sad for as long as possible to show them that you miss them. But then I realize that no, they must want me to be happy,” he says.
Harry, 39, who has criticized in recent years what he says was a lack of family support after the tragic death of his mother in 1997, which he believes led him to repress his emotions and eventually to seek therapy, he added:
“I think that’s the hardest thing, especially for kids, which is, ‘I don’t want to talk about it because it will make me sad, but once I realize that if I talk about it, I’m celebrating his life,’ then, things actually get easier”…as opposed to “I’m just not going to talk about it, and that’s the best way to deal with it”, when in reality it’s not. It may be for a period of time… you can’t suppress it forever. It is not sustainable. And it will eat you up inside.
Prince Harry has starred in a new video talking about grief, urging children and young people to talk about their emotions
‘You convince yourself that the person you’ve lost loves you, or you need to be sad for as long as possible to show them that you miss them. But then there’s the realization that no, they must want me to be happy,” she said.
“No one wants to be in a position where they are forced to talk about what they don’t want to talk about, especially when all the defense mechanisms in their mind, their nervous system and everything else are telling them, ‘don’t go there.'” .’
The emotionally charged video was made in May, when he last visited the UK, and sees the prince speaking to Nikki Scott, founder of Scotty’s Little Soldiers, as she recounts the heartbreaking moment she had to tell her son about five years: Kai, that his father, Corporal Lee Scott, who served in the 2nd Royal Tank Regiment, had been killed in Afghanistan in 2009. At the time he also had a seven-month-old daughter, Brooke.
It has been published by the charity in the run-up to Armed Forces Day on Saturday to highlight the current needs of bereaved military children in the UK.
Ms. Scott’s personal tragedy inspired her to create Scotty’s Little Soldiers after seeing the positive impact a family vacation had on her son.
Prince Harry spoke in the run-up to Armed Forces Day on Saturday to highlight the current needs of bereaved military children in the UK.
Mrs. Scott’s personal tragedy (pictured, right) inspired her to create Scotty’s Little Soldiers after seeing the positive impact a family vacation had on her son.
Expressing his admiration for her work, Prince Harry commented: ‘What you’ve done is incredible.
‘It’s truly inspiring. “I feel really honored and privileged to be a part of Scotty’s now and I really hope that we do everything we can to attract more people, more interest, raise more funds and be able to spread the message to give more children the support they so desperately need.”
Scotty’s Little Soldiers currently supports over 680 members and estimates that each year 2,100 children lose a parent who served in the British Armed Forces.