Prince Harry opened up about the death of his mother, Princess Diana, in a preface to a new book made for children who have lost a parent to COVID-19. Harry, who was 12 when his mother died, wrote that despite the “hole” a parent causes, the memories of them live on forever.
The book ‘Hospital by the Hill’ tells the story of a child whose mother died of COVID-19 while working on the front lines of the pandemic. The book has been made available for free to children in the United Kingdom.
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“When I was a young boy, I lost my mother. At the time I didn’t want to believe or accept it, and it left a huge hole in me,” Prince Harry wrote. “I know how you feel and I want to assure you that over time that hole will be filled with so much love and support. … as a parent goes to heaven, their spirit, their love and the memories of told them Don’t. ”
“They are always with you and you can hold them forever.”
Diana, Princess of Wales, died of injuries sustained in a car accident in 1997. The car Diana was driving had been chased by paparazzi leading up to the accident.
Chris Connaughton, the book’s author, wrote on the book’s website that “writing about death is difficult,” but that “talking about it can be even harder.” The book was written with the help of child mortality specialists.
“It’s always hard and terrible to deal with the death of someone you love, to lose someone who loved you,” Connaughton wrote. “… Whoever you think of, I hope this story helps make some of the hard and awful things a little bit easier.”
The book was released on Friday and was immediately received with praise on Twitter.
“Grief is hard for an adult, but [for] a child it is unimaginable, ‘one user said“I lost my sister to COVID and my heart breaks every time I think about her and the pain she went through all by herself.”
The Duke of Sussex often speaks fondly of his late mother and has often compared her critically-heavy experience in the royal family to what his wife, Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, is currently going through.
In an interview with Oprah Winfrey on March 7th, he said that “all she could ever want is for us to be happy” and that Diana would be “very angry” about how Meghan has been treated since the couple got married in 2018. He attributed his and Meghan’s ability to leave their royal duties to Diana.
“I’ve brought what my mother left me,” he said to Winfrey. “And we couldn’t have done this without it, so when I come back to what my mom would think of this, I think she saw it coming. I certainly felt her presence throughout this process.”