Prince Harry is opening up about the pain from his childhood.
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In a new interview, the prince revealed that after his mother Princess Diana died, he suffered from panic attacks.
“In my case, suit and tie, every single time I was in any room with loads of people, which is quite often, I was just pouring with sweat, like heart beating. Boom, boom, boom, boom and literally just like a washing machine,” he said, according to PEOPLE. “I was like, ‘Oh my God, get me out of here now. Oh, hang on, I can’t get out of here, I have got to just hide it.'”
Harry revealed that he didn’t realize he needed to seek professional help with his grief until he served in Afghanistan.
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“If you lose your mum at the age of 12, you have got to deal with it,” he said. “The idea that 20 years later I still hadn’t really […] that 15, 17 years later I still hadn’t dealt with it. Afghan was the moment where I was like, ‘Right, deal with it.’”
“Once I plucked my head out of the sand, post-Afghan, it had a huge, life changing moment for me. It was like, right, you are Prince Harry, you can do this, as long are you’re not a complete tit, then you’re gonna be able to get that support, because you’ve got the credibility of 10 years’ service, and therefore, you can really make a difference,” he added.
For Prince Harry, meeting with other people who were going through similar traumas helped him cope and he encouraged others to seek help.
“You help yourself, so you can help others,” Harry said. “And I think that is hugely powerful.”