Meghan Markle’s British friends warned her against marrying Prince Harry, telling her that tabloid newspapers “will destroy your life”.
Speaking about her first year as a member of the royal family, the Duchess of Sussex said she had tried to put on a “stiff upper lip”, but was not prepared for the media interest she now faces.
“It’s hard,” she told ITV documentary Harry & Meghan: An African Journey. “I don’t think anybody could understand that, but in all fairness I had no idea, which probably sounds difficult to understand…
“But when I first met my now-husband my friends were really happy because I was so happy, but my British friends said to me, ‘I’m sure he’s great but you shouldn’t do it because the British tabloids will destroy your life’.”
However, the 38-year-old – who was an actress before she married Prince Harry – said she “very naively” didn’t understand what her friends meant, telling them: “I’m not in tabloids.
“I didn’t get it, so it’s been complicated,” she added.
Meghan’s comments come just weeks after it was revealed she is suing the Mail on Sunday over a breach of privacy after it published a private letter between her and her estranged father.
Meanwhile, Harry has also begun legal action at the High Court in relation to the alleged illegal interception of voicemail messages by Sun, News of the World and Daily Mirror journalists.
According to the Sunday Times, the couple are set to take some time out of the media spotlight from next month, taking a six-week break from royal duties.
They are expected to take their baby son Archie, who was born in May, to visit Meghan’s mother Doria Ragland in Los Angeles.
During the couple’s recent southern Africa tour, Meghan was asked if she could continue to cope with the pressure and what would happen if she could not.
“In all honesty I have said for a long time to H – that is what I call him – it’s not enough to just survive something, that’s not the point of life,” she said. “You have got to thrive. You have got to feel happy, and I think I really tried to adopt this British sensibility of a stiff upper lip.
“I tried, I really tried, but I think what that does internally is probably really damaging, and the biggest thing that I know is that I never thought this would be easy but I thought it would be fair, and that is the part that is hard to reconcile but [I] just take each day as it comes.”
Meghan added: “The good thing is that I have got my baby and I have got my husband and they are the best.”