Prince Harry And Meghan Markle's Travel Plans Revolve Around This Unwritten Rule In Their Marriage
A class about grief is the last place most people would look for a member of the royal family, yet Prince Harry now finds himself among MasterClass's instructors. During his "Redefining Grief: Building Resilience Through Loss" debut, where he shared the podium with grief neuroscientist Mary-Frances O'Connor, Prince Harry opened up about the death of his mother Princess Diana. He let slip a detail about what keeps his marriage to Meghan Markle healthy and enduring, and it has to do with a secret balance. Per the Duke of Sussex's own words, the secret is "no more than 10 days away from my wife and kids." (per People)
According to what he said, time at home with his wife and the couple's two children, Prince Archie and Princess Lilibet, recharges him. Capping his absence at 10 days is how he keeps his separate worlds of being a father and a husband and a philanthropist from crowding one another out. The arithmetic is an intriguing revelation, to say the least, since the Sussex solo outings have often been used to feed Prince Harry and Meghan Markle split rumors. The duke even joked about it once when the matter was brought up. "We've apparently divorced maybe 10, 12 times," he said at the New York Times' DealBook Summit on December 4, 2024 (via ABC News). But the bit in MasterClass suggests he lives by a more precise code, one that helps the family stay close. He didn't come up with it after his marriage, either, and it might technically not have been his idea.
The 10-day cap started out as Meghan Markle's two-week rule
Before their marriage and children, and before Prince Harry left the royal family and relocated to California, it was the former Hollywood actress who came up with something close to the 10-day arrangement. In Episode 1 of Netflix's "Harry & Meghan," which premiered December 8, 2022, Prince Harry looked back on their first months of dating in 2016. He shared per Elle, "She had a two-week rule, which was very smart." It apparently required them to meet every 14 days. He couldn't see how his schedule would allow it, but Markle made it work by being the one to hop on flights and go to him.
The arrangement must be a big part of their relationship, if only because they keep bringing it up. Another instance came during their engagement interview with the BBC on November 27, 2017. Markle confirmed they'd never let more than a fortnight pass between visits, and Harry added that she would stay a week at most — sometimes only four days — then return to Toronto to appear on the "Suits" set. The priority, he told the BBC, was "making sure that our relationship is always put first."
That window has apparently shrunk from 10 days to 14, which makes sense because Prince Harry now has to be there for Prince Archie and Princess Lilibet, too. The subtle role reversal is also noteworthy. In 2016, Markle was the one taking transatlantic flights and working the relationship around a filming schedule. By 2026, Prince Harry, by his own account, was the one counting the days on the road.