Prince Harry has revealed he experienced panic attacks driving to work and later “slipped into depression” after relocating to Canada with Meghan Markle and their son Archie.
The Duke of Sussex, 40, made the admissions in a new MasterClass episode focused on mental health, where he traced his psychological struggles from his Army service through his 2020 royal departure. Harry described how his military years at age 20 had functioned as a “distraction” following Princess Diana’s death, allowing him to avoid confronting his grief for roughly two decades.
“For 15, 20 years, when I was being asked, ‘Are you okay?’ My response was, ‘I’m fine.’
“It was numbness, emotional shutdown. And without knowing it, adrenaline was pushing me, was driving me.”
Harry explained that his focus narrowed entirely to immediate tasks, which deepened his downward spiral without his recognition. The turning point came after his 2013 return from Afghanistan, when he began connecting his present symptoms to accumulated trauma.
“The things that I saw, the things I experienced, appeared to be a trigger for other traumas that had stored themselves within me.
“I started to realize that I probably had become seriously depleted when just putting a simple dress shirt on – the tightening of the collar – literally felt like I was suffocating, and I would be experiencing panic attacks just in the car on the way to work.”
The physical manifestation of his anxiety—suffocating sensations from a tightened collar—marked a severe deterioration in his condition. Harry noted he hadn’t “really think about much else apart from the task at hand” during his service years, a pattern that left him psychologically depleted.
His mental health challenges intensified following his and Meghan’s 2020 step back from royal duties. After arriving in Canada with Markle and their young son Archie, Harry encountered what he termed an “adrenaline crash” unlike anything he had previously experienced.
“I actually slipped into depression for about two weeks and I felt like I couldn’t function without adrenaline.”
The MasterClass episode represents Harry’s most detailed public accounting of his personal mental health journey to date. His disclosures build upon years of advocacy work, including the 2016 Heads Together campaign launched alongside Prince William, 42, and Kate Middleton, now Princess of Wales, which united multiple mental health charities to combat stigma. The brothers collaborated on several initiatives before their relationship deteriorated, with Harry having previously characterized their bond as strained while William has maintained privacy regarding the rift.