Ever since the Duchess of Sussex admitted on television that she's struggling with such intense press scrutiny – especially as a new mother – my social feed has been pebble-dashed with astonishing levels of vitriol for her.
Toby Young sarcastically tweeted ‘Poor, poor Meghan Markle’, citing her private jets and "lavishly-redecorated" home, then signed off with a crying-face emoji. Even people I know, or at least share interests with, are sharing posts like,’I don't believe it for a second, she's trying to be a second Diana’, or even ‘Oh, boo hoo, no one cares, Meghan. Tell it to your butler.’
The assumption seems to be that privilege itself exempts you from basic human compassion, and that anyone who enjoys a certain level of privilege actually deserves to suffer.
This is a pretty toxic worldview. Especially as I'm willing to bet it's one that – deep, down, during her darkest moments – Meghan may hold herself. Take it from me. I've experienced both significant privilege and significant pain, and for the longest time I genuinely believed my privilege meant my pain didn't matter.
I had a nervous breakdown when I was 21, complete with insomnia, debilitating panic attacks and weight loss so severe that, having spent my teenage years believing that a "thigh gap" was essentially fiction, I could now cross my legs three times over in the psychiatrist's chair.
However, the psychiatrist was having a hard time getting me to admit I had any problems at all. I'd had a private education, I told her. I'd grown up financially secure, and had never gone hungry for a single day of my life. I felt utterly fraudulent even having a nervous breakdown when other people managed to carry on through life with so much less than me.
It was a full 18 months before I could even admit to the massive bereavement, violent racist attacks, sexual assaults and other past unhappinesses that had brought me to this point – simply because I was so aware of my privilege.
Admittedly, my privilege isn't on a par with the Duchess of Sussex's, but we share other struggles. Like Meghan Markle, I was an older first-time mother of mixed heritage who had relocated to a new environment to live near her husband's family, while becoming estranged from her own.
The fact that someone like Meghan Markle – with her lavish house and private jets – isn't finding it easy, either, must be such a comfort to a new mum.
All of this served to make me feel quite nervous and isolated, a feeling that intensified when my first son was born by emergency C-section after I developed sepsis in labour. New motherhood hit me like a ton of bricks. Every moment was either terrifying or an exercise in failure – later I'd be diagnosed with postnatal depression and post-traumatic stress disorder.
Quite often, I heard the phrase Toby Young levelled at Meghan Markle – the implication that whatever I'd gone through didn't matter because I had a "healthy baby" – which only served to make me feel more isolated, and worse about myself.
That is why I think it's a brilliant thing that Meghan Markle is speaking up. New motherhood, even in the best circumstances, is an enormous sea-change, and challenging to come to terms with. If your experience isn't perfect, it's hard to express this for fear of seeming churlish or ungrateful.
So the fact that someone like Meghan Markle – with her lavish house and private jets and all the other accoutrements of privilege her detractors weigh against her like actual crimes – isn't finding it easy, either, must be such a comfort to a new mum. It would be for me.
The truth is almost everyone enjoys a privilege that someone else doesn't, whether that's health, wealth, support, status, or something else. We all deserve compassion, no matter what our lot is in life. There's no glass ceiling for wellbeing or pain or mental health, and there shouldn't be for basic human kindness, either. And you can't buy happiness from Harrods. I've tried
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'I'm Not OK' Says Meghan Markle As She Opens Up About Her Struggles As A Vulnerable New Mum