Prince Harry Reflects on Living in the U.S. With Meghan Markle: ‘I Very Much Enjoy Living Here’

Prince Harry and Meghan Markle are enjoying living in the States, and the duke and duchess have no plans to return to the U.K.

“I very much enjoy living here and bringing my kids up here,” Harry, 40, told Andrew Ross Sorkin during his appearance at the New York Times Dealbook Summit on Wednesday, December 4.

The father of two also boasted about the privacy and freedom he and Meghan, 42, have been able to enjoy in America, something they “undoubtedly wouldn’t be able to do in the U.K.”

After Harry and Meghan took a step back from their royal duties in January 2020, his security was downgraded. He has since pursued legal action regarding the policy changes surrounding his police protection while in the United Kingdom.

Harry also touched on the impact that fame had on him as a child growing up in the spotlight. His mother, the late Princess Diana, was tragically killed in a car crash in August 1997 as she was being chased by paparazzi. Andrew, 47, mentioned that Harry wrote in his memoir, Spare, that his war with the media “unknowingly began in 1997.”

“I think again, when you are kind of trapped within this bubble, it kind of feels like there’s no way out,” Harry explained. “What happened to my mom and the fact that I was a kid and felt helpless, there comes the inner turmoil. I felt helpless. One of my biggest weaknesses is feeling helpless.”

He continued, “It was something that I knew I couldn’t fix, and it was also a situation that I knew I couldn’t get out of. The thing that has worried me the most was that what happened to [my mom] was going to happen to me and ‘Is that going to happen to my wife?’ or ‘Is that going to happen to my kids?’”

Harry also opened up about how much seeing a therapist has helped him overcome different things in his life.

“It’s helped me massively,” Harry told Andrew. “I highly encourage it and for me, it burst a few bubbles for me. Therapy, for me, was a blessing, and it was really what I would describe as ‘cleaning the windshield.’”

He also admitted that therapy somewhat opened his eyes to what the public thought about him versus who he really was as a person.

Along with discussions of therapy, Harry also put the divorce rumors about himself and Meghan to rest.

“Apparently we’ve bought or moved house 10, 12 times,” Harry joked on stage. “We’ve apparently divorced maybe 10, 12 times as well. So it’s just like, what?”

He added that while the amount of attention he and Meghan receive might seem flattering, he didn’t consider it a “good thing.”

“It’s hard to keep up with, but that’s why you just sort of ignore it,” Harry explained. “The people I feel most sorry about are the trolls. Their hopes are just built and built, and it’s like, ‘Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes,’ and then it doesn’t happen. So I feel sorry for them. Genuinely, I do.”