Meghan Markle ‘tends to leave’ Prince Harry ‘at home’: Report
A society insider has claimed that the Duchess of Sussex has been enjoying the social scene but that her husband is nowhere to be seen.
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Prince Harry, the Duke of Sussex is a man in need of many things: A hug, a better therapist, a clue, and maybe someone to give him some tough love. Also: A fairy godmother.
Because despite being California’s most blue-blooded taxpayer, the man sounds like he might require some magic-wand toting wisp because according to a new report, the duke has not been getting to the ball, so to speak.
Like a Cinderella with a bald patch, the duke has been ‘left at home’, according to society journalist Petronella Whyatt, who speaking to The Sun, has revealed that Harry’s wife Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex has reportedly been out and about, sans King Charles’ problem child.
“Friends of mine who live near them are always bumping into Meghan at parties these days. She tends to leave Harry at home,” Wyatt has said.
Now, maybe Aitch is just a bit pooped, what with him coming off the back of a 21st-century version of a Viking raid on the British throne. (Less oars required I suppose.) Or maybe the man just wants a quiet night in to re-read a few choice Favourite Five novels or to work on his adult colouring book or because he wants to play Call of Duty in nothing but his oodie.
Maybe this is entirely Harry and Meghan’s choosing and they are happy as organic clams for him to chill out eating instant ramen while watching Gilmore Girls while she embraces the social whirl and uses her title with the moneyed preschool mums.
However Wyatt’s comment comes hot on the heels of a recent Telegraph report that claimed that a hotel in their adopted hometown of Montecito has “a room set aside for Harry where he occasionally stays on his own” and that the San Vincente Bungalows two-hours to the south in Los Angeles are “his escape place.”
Team Sussex was quick to put out a denial, telling Page Six of the hotel situation, “This is not true,” though it’s worth noting that the Telegraph story has not been amended nor has the trigger-happy couple issued any sort of lawyer’s letter.
With the couple having just passed their five year wedding anniversary, whatever happened to Harry and Meghan and their signature apotheosis of coupledom?
We all know that these two have managed to take hand-holding to Olympic levels, including at a war graves cemetery and then coming under fire from some quarters for their touchy feely ways during the Queen’s funeral. (I’d personally file that one under ‘touching.’)
They might have been two crazy kids who junked royal life with an Instagram post but no matter your position on their shocking exit or their dirty linen-airing or their family tattling, these two have given us slightly nauseating lovebird-dom from day one.
Until now.
Last month Harry and Meghan appeared together for the first time in six months, taking in an LA Lakers Game with their staff in a private box, an outing only slightly less blatant than if they had pitched up with sandwich boards in front of People’s offices that read ‘Official return to the spotlight.’
But unlike the past when the couple have fervently held onto one another when out in public, during the game when they were put up on the kiss cam they demurred. Huh.
Trying to decipher what this all could mean is about as precise a science as reading tea leaves but this ‘left at home’ does raise some largely overlooked aspects of the Sussex love story.
Take the fact that they had only lived together for a matter of weeks when they got engaged.
Their first date was in July 2016 and for the next 16 months they flew backwards and forwards between London and Toronto, famously never going two weeks without seeing each other. In November 2017, Meghan officially moved to London and the same month he proposed using battery-powered candles that look like they came from a Spotlight discount bin.
Any couple tying the knot who had not even lived in the same country for any real length of time before they decided to marry would be a bit of a worry, let alone when you pile on the towering heap of other stresses and strains they have faced.
It might only have been five years since their wedding and while I’m sure there have been high highs like the birth of their two children, by their own account it has been a rocky and arduous one for lots of time too.
Meghan has spoken at length about experiencing suicidal ideation during her first pregnancy with son Prince Archie and her mental health struggles. In last year’s Netflix series, Harry said that he ‘believed’ that Meghan had miscarried in 2020 due to the stress of the court case she was embroiled in with the Daily Mail.
Then, add on top that in only a handful of years, she have both become estranged from their families, they have moved countries twice, moved house four times in just over a year, had another baby, gone to the barricades in taking on an 1000-year-old institution and had to suddenly start earning a hell of a lot of money and fast to keep the lights on.
The pressure they must have been under – or perhaps are still under – would have most people reaching for the Nyquil and a family-sized packet of Cadbury Dairy Milk, let alone when you add in that they probably permanently have TMZ parked outside their front gate.
Another factor: Harry and Meghan, on paper, would seem to be completely different people when it comes to career, interests and education.
The duchess has a degree from a top university; the duke went straight into the military. Meghan spent her downtime travelling and writing Eat Pray Love-lite contemplative posts for her blog, The Tig; Harry used to love, reportedly, hunting weekends and boozy boys trips overseas. She has worked in a variety of jobs including as a calligrapher, game show briefcase girl and acting; he, pre-Megxit, had only ever worked for his grandmother, first in the military and then undertaking official royal duties.
None of this is insurmountable stuff but add it all up and Harry and Meghan have really faced, and might still face, some strong headwinds.
That same Telegraph story quoted a friend of theirs saying that they are “like any parents of such young kids: frazzled.
“They are really happy together … But at the end of the day, they’ve been through a lot and I think they’ve both felt quite ground down by it all. They’re like any married couple, five years in.”
One insider told the Telegraph: “Nobody really speaks to him any more and even the people who have remained by his side have lately begun to fall away because he is so consistently negative. He’s often complaining and rarely asks after others.”
Let’s hope that, like Cinderella, Harry and Meghan have found their happily ever after because I’m not sure if a few singing birds could change things for them now.
Daniela Elser is a writer, editor and a royal commentator with more than 15 years’ experience working with a number of Australia’s leading media titles
Originally published as Meghan Markle ‘tends to leave’ Prince Harry ‘at home’: Report
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