London: The Duke of Cambridge has described how he still feels the shock of his mother’s death 20 years later, as he followed his brother Prince Harry’s lead by pledging: “It’s time that everyone speaks up.”
The Duke, who was 15 when Diana, Princess of Wales, died, said the loss of a parent was “such an unbelievably big moment”, adding: “You never get over it.” Speaking in a new BBC documentary about mental health issues, he said: “People go ‘shock can’t last that long’ but it does.” Prince Harry received universal praise earlier last week after speaking in depth about his past for the first time. He told The Daily Telegraph he had sought counselling after spending 20 years burying his head in the sand over his mother’s death and enduring two years of “total chaos”.
Speaking after a preview screening of the documentary, he told an audience: “The more we have influential and very important people speaking about their issues and their battles, the better.”
The Duke also appeared in a video with pop star Lady Gaga, talking to her about mental health issues and declaring: “It’s time that everyone speaks up.” He, Prince Harry and the Duchess of Cambridge will appear in Mind Over Marathon, a documentary about 10 “unlikely runners” with different mental health issues training for the London Marathon.
Each of the young royals spent time with the runners. One participant, 39-year-old Rhian Burke, asked the Duke’s advice on how to help her two children cope with the deaths of their father and one-year-old brother, who died within five days of each other in 2012. She said: “When your mum passed away, you were obviously a bit older than my children but I obviously worry about them growing up. They’ll be OK, won’t they?” The Duke replied: “They’ll be absolutely fine. With a mum like you, they’ll be absolutely fine. Because you’re aware of all this, you’re already a step ahead of what could happen. Like you said, the shock is the biggest thing. I still feel, 20 years later about my mother, I still have shock within me. You know, 20 years later. People go ‘shock can’t last that long’ but it does. You never get over it. It’s such an unbelievably big moment in your life that it never leaves you, you just learn to deal with it.”
The most important thing, he added, was Burke being there to provide a “blanket of stability and understanding” for her two children.
— The Telegraph Group Limited, London 2017
