Women’s Wellness Spa(ce), based outside of Philadelphia, exists to help women struggling to cope with past traumatic experiences.
Perhaps that is why it has struck a chord with the Duchess of Sussex, who found her time as a royal so distressing and who has now been so keen to fund the American charity’s pioneering therapeutic work.
The organization, founded by President Biden’s daughter Ashley, was the lead beneficiary last year of Harry and Meghan’s charitable foundation, Archewell. The charity was said to “resonate” with the Sussexes.
As a “founding partner” and supporter of the “trauma-informed” wellness center, the Archewell Foundation last year donated almost £200,000 ($250,000) to it to help with its work “creating a safe space” for “affected women.” because of the trauma.” . The center offers nutritious food, exercise, meditation and ‘therapeutic interventions,’ says the Archewell Foundation’s 2023-2024 Impact Report, which was released Monday, along with its tax records.
Both documents have raised surprising questions about the Sussexes’ philanthropic ventures and their intriguing priorities. One of the “therapeutic interventions” identified by Archewell is Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR), a therapy that Prince Harry has said he has found useful in treating unresolved anxiety stemming from the death of his mother, the Princess. Diana, when she was 12 years old.
Developed by an American psychologist in the 1980s, EMDR encourages patients to hold an unpleasant memory in their mind while a therapist instructs them to move their eyes in a specific pattern.
Proponents say EMDR can help people process disturbing feelings and memories, including post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Critics have dismissed it as pseudoscience and the evidence that it works has been disappointing, although it is available on the NHS. Ashley Biden, 43, a fashion designer, philanthropist and social worker, credits therapy with helping her cope with the loss of her half-brother, Beau, who died at age 46 from brain cancer in 2015.
The Sussexes’ generosity toward a charity created by a member of the Biden family is surely no coincidence.
In September, the California Attorney General banned Harry and Meghan’s Archewell charity from collecting or spending donations, but the ban was later lifted.
Ashley Biden, who founded The Women’s Wellness Spa(ce), with her father Joe
Archewell’s £200,000 donation provides a revealing insight into the Sussexes’ concerns. And while the couple is rocked by claims that their personal money-making ventures are not performing as impressively, their charity has at least been able to report some growth in its third year of filing taxes.
His latest tax return revealed he had received just under £4,184,000 in grants, more than double the amount he raised the previous year but far less than the £10 million or so he racked up in 2021.
To accompany this good news, the Sussexes released a video this week celebrating the Foundation’s work set to Coldplay’s A Sky Full of Stars. At the end of the video, Prince Harry says, “Each of you inspires me and us every day.” So please continue to be there to support each other.”
In fact, Archewell remains largely dependent on the “support” of a handful of donors. Last year its income was almost entirely reduced to a single donor who gave almost £4 million. Although this benefactor is not mentioned in the filing, it is understood to be Fidelity Charitable, the philanthropic arm of financial services giant Fidelity Investments. He had donated almost £800,000 the previous year.
Some £264,000 of Archewell’s remaining income came from five different individual taxpayers, who are also not named. Meanwhile, in 2023, the charity donated just over £1 million ($1.3 million) to deserving causes.
The charity’s tax filing also revealed that the couple nominally devoted one hour per week to Archewell’s operations, which is standard practice for directors of tax-exempt U.S. organizations.
He confirmed that Meghan and Harry do not receive any salaries from their foundation, although its senior staff are well paid. James Holt, a former Sussex lackey and co-chief executive of Archewell, earned almost £195,000 including benefits, while co-director Shauna Nep earned just over £235,000.
Archewell also paid £122,000 to Herlihy Loughran, a PR firm run by Beth Herlihy, a former actress who once played a stripper in soap Hollyoaks and who has worked for them since her days at Kensington Palace.
The Sussexes have also collaborated with the Bidens on projects such as Harry’s Invictus Games. Joe and Ashley are pictured above.
Ashley Biden, right, with her mother Jill, left, and France’s first lady Brigitte Macron in Paris last year.
Ashley’s center is said to offer nutritious food, exercise, meditation and “therapeutic interventions.”
Of course, the Sussexes’ charity hasn’t always worked so well. In September, California’s Attorney General banned Archewell from raising or spending donations and listed the Foundation as “delinquent,” warning that it faced action amid reports that it had not filed its tax returns on time. The charity’s experts blamed a check that disappeared in the mail. The ban was later lifted.
Meanwhile, the Sussexes’ recently revealed generosity toward a charity created by a member of the Biden family (as the only child of Joe and First Lady Jill, Ashley is officially America’s First Daughter) is surely no coincidence.
The Sussexes have collaborated with the Bidens on projects such as Harry’s Invictus Games.
Although they reportedly unsuccessfully asked the Bidens to fly them back to the US on Air Force One when they all returned from the late Queen’s funeral in 2022, the Biden administration refused to disclose Prince Harry’s visa application during a court case in New York. – after campaigners sought to see if the Duke had lied about his drug use to obtain the crucial document – although the government said speculation about irregularities was “unfounded”.
Some have linked the Sussexes’ enthusiasm for the Bidens to Meghan’s enthusiasm for politics and perhaps even a future career on Capitol Hill. A strong Democratic supporter, in 2021 she pressured US senators by calling them (and introducing herself as ‘Meghan, Duchess of Sussex’) to support paid family leave in a budget bill.
While her aides dismissed the claim as “ridiculous,” she was also rumored to have run as a possible replacement for Kamala Harris when she had to give up her Senate seat to become vice president in 2021.
And although there are no reports that the two women are friends, the always elegant and immaculate Ashley is surely Meghan’s type of philanthropist. It is also undeniable that, infused as it is with the language and ideas of the California-style wellness thinking they have adopted, the Women’s Wellness Spa(ce) is the Sussexes’ kind of charity.
It describes itself as “a walk-in wellness center consciously designed for women to gather, create, educate and meditate.” Her space was designed by Ashley herself and aims to “improve all aspects of well-being (mental, physical, spiritual and financial) by healing ourselves, caring for each other and acting on behalf of our communities.”
Ashley has said the center was inspired by her previous work in the criminal justice system helping formerly incarcerated women adjust to life after their release.
And Ashley has certainly had to deal with her own traumas. Like her troubled half-brother Hunter, who was pardoned by her father for criminal offenses this week, Ashley has struggled with addiction, which she admitted in a diary.
The newspaper was later stolen and sold to a conservative group by a woman who was sentenced to a month in prison for the crime. In an impact statement to the court, Ashley said she had been a victim of crime in her early 20s and subsequently developed post-traumatic stress disorder. “The diary that was stolen from me was part of my efforts to heal,” she said.
Other recipients of Archewell’s generosity in 2023 included organizations providing mental health support to humanitarian workers in Israel, Gaza and Syria, as well as others supporting refugees and promoting menstrual health in Nigeria. All laudable groups, but they didn’t get as much money as the one with the Biden connection.