Prince Harry is opening about about his move to Canada in late 2019 and the toll it took on his mental health.
In a new MasterClass, which is a streaming platform for online learning, the Duke of Sussex said he experienced an “adrenaline crash” after relocating from England to Vancouver Island in 2019.
“It was myself, my wife and our son Archie, and we moved to Canada to get some space away from everything just to be able to think,” Harry said, according to People and The Hollywood Reporter.
“Being in Canada, away from the stressful environment where presumably my body was just pumped full of adrenaline, within two or three days, I experienced this adrenaline crash, something that I’d never experienced before,” Harry continued.
“It was as if I needed stress in order to get the adrenaline to make my brain function because I became useless around the house,” he added.
Harry revealed that he started to struggle with his mental health following the move.
“I actually slipped into depression for about two weeks. I felt like I couldn’t function without the adrenaline,” he revealed.
Harry spoke about the move to Canada in the MasterClass titled, Redefining Grief: Building Resilience Through Loss, while speaking with neuroscientist Dr. Mary-Frances O’Connor.
During the MasterClass, Harry also spoke about the grief he experienced after losing his mother, the late Princess Diana, at the age of 12.
“I couldn’t remember my mom’s laugh. I couldn’t remember what she looked like. I felt like I had to be sad in order to prove to her that I miss her,” Harry said.
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“In my 20s, I went to war twice thinking I could outrun my feelings. But that’s not what happened,” he added. “I’d spent so long emotionally numb to a large extent because nobody told me joy was still allowed. That it wasn’t betrayal.”
Harry and his wife, Meghan Markle, moved to Canada in late 2019 with their son Prince Archie. In January 2020, the couple announced that they were stepping down as working senior members of the British Royal Family.
When the couple first moved to Canada they announced that they’d be financially supporting themselves, living primarily in Canada and paying back British taxpayers for the multi-million dollar renovations on their Windsor home of Frogmore Cottage.
The family of three spent six weeks in Victoria over the Christmas holidays in 2019, which first prompted speculation that they’d be purchasing a home in the Canadian city.
In February 2020, it was revealed that Canadian taxpayers had been paying some of the security costs for Harry and Meghan since November 2019 but that would stop “in the coming weeks,” a spokesperson for then-public safety minister Bill Blair told Global News at the time.
“The Duke and Duchess of Sussex choosing to re-locate to Canada on a part-time basis presented our government with a unique and unprecedented set of circumstances,” the spokesperson said at the time.
“The RCMP has been engaged with officials in the U.K. from the very beginning regarding security considerations. As the Duke and Duchess are currently recognized as Internationally Protected Persons, Canada has an obligation to provide security assistance on an as-needed basis.
“At the request of the Metropolitan Police, the RCMP has been providing assistance to the Met since the arrival of the Duke and Duchess to Canada intermittently since October 2019. The assistance will cease in the coming weeks, in keeping with their change in status.”
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex moved to Montecito, Calif., four months after relocating to Canada.
In June 2020 following the couple’s move to California, the Canadian Taxpayers Federation said the RCMP spent more than $50,000 on overtime and logistics costs to provide security for Harry and Meghan during their stay in B.C.
Documents obtained through an access to information request revealed the total price tag added up to $56,384 for their stay from Nov. 18, 2019, and Jan. 19, 2020. The figure did not include salaries or any overtime costs after Jan. 19.
Harry and Meghan have now returned to Britain, six years after they quit royal duties and relocated to Canada and the U.S.
The couple plans to maintain their home in Montecito, Calif., and their vacation property in Portugal during their return to the United Kingdom for an extended stay, which began this fall, The Associated Press reports.
The location of their new home and details of the children’s school have been kept private but last month, a spokesperson for the Duke and Duchess of Sussex confirmed the children were changing schools after just two days due to security concerns.
“The decision for the children to move school was taken following a discussion with the family’s security team about the practicalities of their current arrangements,” a spokesman for Harry and Meghan said in a statement to Reuters.
“The parents remain extremely grateful to all the teachers and staff for the love, care and effort they have shown their family,” the spokesperson added.
Reuters reports that the distance between their home and the original school caused concern for their security team due to heavy traffic in the area.
Ahead of the couple’s return to the U.K., King Charles III restated in a letter that Harry and Meghan will not undertake royal duties.
—With files from Global News’ Amanda Connolly and Amy Judd
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