Meghan Markle is a magazine cover girl once more. To celebrate the launch of her new podcast series Archetypes, the first episode of which debuted on Spotify last week with Serena Williams as the guest, the Duchess of Sussex invited The Cut into her and Prince Harry’s Montecito home for an interview that spans everything from imminent Instagram returns to the couple’s continued tense relationship with the British royal family.
On the topic of social media, Meghan Markle asked journalist Allison P Davis if she wanted to know a secret while the pair were sitting in her Californian living room. “I’m getting back … on Instagram,” Markle said, which Davis noted could be a troll if it wasn’t for the context surrounding this confession: Markle having to give up her autonomy — her job, her home, the country she was living in, her website, The Tig, and, of course, her Instagram — to join the royal family when she met and later married Prince Harry.
“It was a big adjustment — a huge adjustment to go from that kind of autonomy to a different life,” she said, adding that every photo she wanted to share publicly had to first go to the Royal Rota as protocol: a group of publications who had personally attacked Markle multiple times. “Why would I give the very people that are calling my children the N-word a photo of my child before I can share it with the people that love my child?” she questioned. “You tell me how that makes sense and then I’ll play that game.”
Later, while speaking about her tense relationship with her father Thomas Markle, whom she’s been estranged from since he leaked a private letter to the press ahead of her wedding, Markle also spoke about her husband’s relationship with his father, Prince Charles. “Harry said to me, ‘I lost my dad in this process.’ It doesn’t have to be the same for them as it was for me, but that’s his decision,” she said.
When asked whether there was room to heal the rifts with their families, Markle responded, “I think forgiveness is really important. It takes a lot more energy to not forgive. But it takes a lot of effort to forgive. I’ve really made an active effort, especially knowing that I can say anything.”
“I have a lot to say until I don’t. Do you like that? Sometimes, as they say, the silent part is still part of the song,” she added.
