Discussing his time in the military, the Duke of Sussex said his Afghanistan tour triggered “trauma” of losing his mother Princess Diana in 1997 when he was 12 years old.

“Losing my mum at such a young age was trauma that I had that I was never really aware of. It was never discussed, I didn’t talk about it and I’ve suppressed it like most youngsters would have done,” reported BBC quoting the duke as saying.

“Unfortunately like most of us, the first time you really consider therapy is when you’re lying on the floor in the foetal position, probably wishing that you dealt with some of this stuff previously, ” he added.

The five-part documentary series, Heart of Invictus, tells the story of the duke’s sports competition for servicemen and women who have been injured and disabled.

Prince Harry said he wanted the five-part Netflix documentary series to be like a safety net to catch people, because he lacked the support or understanding of his own “invisible injuries”.

“I didn’t have that support structure, that network or that expert advice to identify what was actually going on with me,” the duke said.

In the documentary Prince Harry explained his own experience the loss of his mother had left him with “no emotion. I was unable to cry, I was unable to feel, I didn’t know it at the time,” the BBC reported.

Prince Harry described the “chaos” when those suppressed feelings were released in his later life.

“My emotions were sprayed all over the wall, everywhere I went. I was like: ‘How the hell do I contain this? I’ve gone from nothing to everything,’ BBC quoted him saying.

“The more it makes people feel uncomfortable, the more we need to talk about it,” Prince Harry said.

The documentary series shows the physical and psychological challenges facing injured military veterans, as they prepared to take part in the Invictus Games, first launched by Prince Harry in 2014.

The Duke of Sussex speaks about his feeling that the public were not fully aware of the reality of the conflict.

Prince Harry served military service in Afghanistan twice. His first military tour in Afghanistan in 2008 ended abruptly when a media embargo was broken and he had to return, while his second tour of four months ended in January 2013.

The next games will be held in Germany next month.

Prince Harry is expected to be joined by his wife Meghan, who appears briefly in the documentary, in Germany next month.

Updated: 30 Aug 2023, 08:52 PM IST