PRINCE Harry’s sources have had another dig at Charles – saying the Duke of Sussex’s moans about parenting are no different to his dad’s criticism of his own parents.
Harry, 36, blasted 72-year-old Charles’s parenting and said he moved to California to “break the cycle of pain” for his wife Meghan in an explosive podcast chat last week.
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Harry claimed his dad “suffered” due to his upbringing by the Queen and Philip, then “treated me the way he was treated”.
Sources close to Harry pointed out to the Telegraph that Charles had spoken about his own unhappy relationship with his parents in a 1994 biography.
In ‘The Prince of Wales: A Biography’, Charles described feeling like an outsider in the Royal Family.
He also described his mum the Queen as being physically and emotionally distant, and said his dad Prince Philip was “harsh” and “hectoring”, while favouring his younger sister Anne.
In the book, Charles blamed Philip for sending him to public school in Scotland where he was bullied, and accused the Duke of Edinburgh of forcing him into marriage.
Last week, Meghan and Harry’s pal Omid Scobie shared a pointed tweet about Charles’s “unresolved childhood issues” mentioned in the book.
Scobie, who helped pen the Megxit biography Finding Freedom, looked to affirm comments made by the Duke of Sussex about how his father “suffered” due to his upbringing and had then treated him the same way.
The reporter, who often shares statements about the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, said: “In 1994, Prince Charles authorised a biography on himself by journalist Jonathan Dimbleby.
“One chapter in it – approved by the prince – talks in great detail about his unresolved childhood issues with ’emotionally distant’ parents.”
He also shared an “interesting” archive article describing Dimbleby’s book.
The piece tells the story of an “emotionally stunted little boy” who is “bogged down by unresolved resentments left over from early boyhood”.
PODCAST CHAT
Harry spoke about his mental health struggles in a brutally frank, and profanity-laden, chat with US podcast host Dax Shepard.
He also claimed that he was told “you need help” while he was growing up but rejected it, saying: “There is nothing wrong with me.”
Only weeks after telling Oprah Winfrey in a bombshell interview that his dad was “trapped”, Harry again opened up about their father-son relationship.
He said on the “Armchair Expert” podcast: “I verbalise it, which is, ‘Isn’t life about breaking the cycle’?
“There’s no blame, I don’t think we should be pointing the finger or blaming anybody.
“But certainly when it comes to parenting, if I have experienced some form of pain or suffering because of the pain or suffering perhaps my father or my parents suffered, I’m gonna make sure that I break that cycle so that I don’t pass it on, basically.
“There is a lot of genetic pain and suffering that gets passed on anyway. As parents we should be doing the most that we can to say, ‘You know what, that happened to me, I’m gonna make sure that’s not going to happen to you’.”
Meghan is expecting a daughter — the couple’s second child — this summer with the family now settling in to their new life in California.
Speaking about the parental differences between him and 72-year-old Charles, Harry said: “It’s really hard to do but for me it comes down to awareness.
“I never saw it, I never knew about it, then suddenly I started to piece it all together and go, ‘OK, so, this is where he went to school, this is what happened’.
“I know this bit about his life, I also know that’s connected to his parents, so that means that he is treating me the way that he was treated.
“Which means, ‘How can I change that for my own kids’? And well, here I am, I have now moved my whole family to the US.
“That wasn’t the plan, do you know what I mean? But sometimes you have got to make decisions and put your family first and your mental health first.”
Harry claimed he “always felt different” from his relatives long before he quit royal duty with Meghan, 39, last year.
He said: “It’s the job, grin and bear and get on with it.” He explained: “Privilege does give you blinkers. Mine were never particularly on straight, I have always felt different.”
He went on: “I was in my early twenties and it was a case of, ‘I don’t want this job. I don’t want to be here. I don’t want to be doing this.’”
During his interview with Oprah Winfrey, Harry claimed his father stopped taking his calls after Megxit and that he was financially cut off by the Royal Family last year.
The Duke of Sussex said there was a “lot of hurt” between him and his father.
Harry said he had tried to raise his intentions of leaving the Royal Family.
He said Charles stopped taking his phone calls for a period of time, saying: “When we were in Canada, I had three conversations with my grandmother and two conversations with my father, before he stopped taking my calls.”
He added: “By that point I took matters into my own hands. I need to do this for my family.
“I’ve got to do something for my own mental health, for my wife’s and for Archie.”
And he said he felt “really let down” by his father, saying: “He knows what pain feels like.
“Of course I will always love him but there’s a lot of hurt that’s happened and I will continue to make it one of my priorities to try and heal that.”
He also revealed the Royal Family had cut him off in the first quarter of 2020.
Harry added: “I didn’t see a way out. I was trapped within the system, just like the rest of my family are.
“My father and my brother – they are trapped. They don’t get to leave and I have huge compassion for that.”
