Prince Harry tonight heaped more misery on his dad King Charles with a series of shocking admissions which included…
- Taking illegal drugs like cannabis and cocaine that changed him.
- Feeling different from the rest of the Royal Family.
- Questioning why Britain went to war in Afghanistan – and claiming he was a typical soldier from “a broken home”.
- Claiming that speaking about his trauma over his mum Diana’s death was an act of service to the world.
The Duke of Sussex – speaking publicly for the first time since he and wife Meghan, 41, were ordered out of their UK royal base at Frogmore Cottage by Charles – denied he was looking for sympathy by publishing blistering allegations in his memoir, Spare.
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But his latest claims in an internet podcast with a controversial self-help guru are likely to cause further divisions with his dad and brother Prince William.
Harry, 38, revealed in the £20-a-head podcast – likely to have been watched by Palace aides – how elements of his childhood were incredibly painful and he always felt slightly different to other royals.
And he drew parallels with mum Diana, who died in 1997 after divorcing Charles.
He said: “I felt strange being in this container and I know that my mum felt the same.
“It makes sense to me. It didn’t make sense at the time. I felt as though my body was in there and my head was out.”
Quizzed by Canadian author Dr Gabor Maté on whether readers would see his memoir as wallowing in self pity, Harry replied: “I definitely don’t see myself as a victim.”
He said people told him Meghan had saved him, adding: “I was stuck in this world and she was from a different world and helped draw me out of that.”
Asked about how it felt to break free from “fancy captivity” by quitting the UK for California, Harry replied: “It feels great. Once the book came out I felt incredibly free. I felt a huge weight off my shoulders. The system in which I was part of doesn’t encourage free living.”
He told Dr Maté how he was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress after seeking counselling over Diana’s death.
Harry said: “When I found my therapist and started to really unpack 12-year-old Harry at the point of where my mother died, that did start to unravel all sorts of other moments. It was scary.”
Harry said he turned to the psychedelic drug ayahuasca to deal with the traumas and added: “It was the cleaning of the windshield, the removal of life’s filters.
“And these layers and filters, it removed it all for me. It brought me a sense of relaxation, release, comfort.”
He added: “I started doing it recreationally and started to realise how good it was for me. It is one of the fundamental parts of my life that changed me and helped me deal with the traumas and pains of the past.”
The duke said of his dabbles with cocaine: “That didn’t do anything for me. It was more a social thing. It gave me a sense of belonging for sure.
“Marijuana is different, that did actually really help me. Alcohol is certainly more of a social thing.”
Harry also claimed a lot of people in the armed forces didn’t agree or disagree with the war in Afghanistan, where he was a helicopter gunship pilot.
He said: “One of the reasons why so many people in the United Kingdom were not supportive of our troops was because they assumed that everybody that was serving was for the war.
“But no, once you sign up, you do what you’re told to do. So there was a lot of us that didn’t necessarily agree or disagree.”
Tonight Col Philip Ingram, a former military intelligence officer and Nato planner, said he believed Harry was wrong to air his views.
He added: “I also think he is wrong saying about troops being against the war because I don’t think that was the case.
