That Time I had a Zoom Call with Prince Harry
The title of this article is not entirely accurate. I should have included that Dr. Gabor Mate was also on that Zoom call. Oh, and it was a paid call (by me). And it was only one way. But those are mere details.
I had many takeaways which I will share here but the best part of the experience was the one I had with my son.
I was sitting in my living room with my laptop connected to the TV so I could watch excitedly with my massive cup of coffee in hand. My son walked into the living room and saw ZOOM across the bottom of the screen. He stopped dead still. He was like a cat who thinks nobody could see them if they don't move. He turned his head to me and whispered, "Mom, can you mute that so I can use the blender?"
"Don't worry. Prince Harry and Dr. Gabor Mate cannot hear me. I can only hear them," I laughed.
"Sweet," he said and marched to the kitchen.
"But thanks for asking," I called out. "And thanks for thinking I'm important enough to have a video chat with Prince Harry and Dr. Gabor Mate," I thought to myself.
I along with many other people purchased a pass to watch a live-stream interview of Prince Harry by Dr. Gabor Mate. They each have a book out: Spare and The Myth of Normal respectively. I've read the latter and got a copy of the former with the purchase of the live-stream access. (Disclosure: There are links on this page that may provide me with a commission at no cost to you should you purchase from them).
They were in an undisclosed area which I assumed was BC, Canada because of the snow outside of the window. Their interaction was more conversational than I anticipated so it felt cozy sitting and listening to them talk on a Saturday morning.
I should note, I know practically nothing about Prince Harry or his family. I have read a few of Dr. Gabor Mate's books.
This is not a recap or summary of the live stream. I jotted down a few things that popped out at me so I'll share them with you. They'll be disjointed...prepare yourself. Imagine looking down at my notepad and seeing these scrawled across the page:
Experiencing trauma is not being victimized, it's being wounded which means there's hope for healing.
Big T trauma is the bad things that happen.
Trauma is the wound, not the event. It's what we make it mean.
Small t trauma is the good things that didn't happen.
Dr. Mate commented that Prince Harry lived with the royal family in "fancy captivity."
Dr. Mate said, "To know ourselves is to be mirrored." To provide context, he said that children learn about themselves by what is reflected back to them by the adults in their lives.
Prince Harry talked about trying to be himself and how that was received. The message he perceived from his family was, "Don't be yourself. Come back to what you're expected to be."
Prince Harry felt forced between being himself or being with his family. Dr. Gabor Mate framed it as, "Do I give up myself to belong?"
Prince Harry shared a number of examples of how little physical contact he received. When he returned from his time in the military, he was met by his father and brother. He was greeted with a hug and a pat on the shoulder, and this felt like an outpouring of love to him. (I drew a broken heart beside that example).
One of the things that upset Prince Harry as a child was how people shared things about him outside of his control.
A review of The Myth of Normal by Dr. Mate will be up on the blog soon-ish. I've yet to receive my copy of Spare but I'll do a review of that as well once I've completed it.
