Prince Harry encouraged veterans gearing up for last year’s Invictus Games to ‘just f**king cry’ if they get emotional as he gave Team UK athletes an inspirational speech, a new programme has revealed.
Speaking on a video call shown during the third episode of Netflix‘s Heart of Invictus, which aired today, the Duke of Sussex, 38, thanked former soldiers for their work and encouraged them to get caught up in the moment.
‘You did it everyday wearing uniform and for one reason or another that uniform had to be hung up,’ the royal told the huge group, led by Team UK captain Rachel Williamson, just weeks before last year’s games in April 2022.
‘That service service that runs in your blood, in our blood – that never leaves the body. It’s there.
‘So when you’re out there, kicking a**, trying to win a medal or just having fun and making your family incredibly proud – when you feel that feeling in your throat and you feel like you might want to cry – then just f**king cry, all right? I mean that.
Prince Harry had encouraged veterans gearing up for last year’s Invictus Games to ‘just f**king cry’ if they get emotional as he gave Team UK athletes an inspirational speech
‘Take care, look after yourselves, look after each other as well.’
The third episode of the show saw veterans from national teams across the world lay bare the reality of living with their injuries, both physical and mental.
All five episodes of the docuseries were made available at 8am UK time (midnight California time), following prior speculation that Netflix had cancelled the show.
The limited series has been released ahead of next month’s Invictus Games which will be in Dusseldorf from September 9 over eight days and attended by Harry and Meghan.
Harry is its executive producer and the show forms part of the Sussexes’ deal with Netflix – with their main output so far being last year’s controversial Harry & Meghan documentary which included a series of swipes at members of the Royal Family.
Pressure is on the Invictus documentary to be a ratings success, after the couple’s other lucrative media deal with Spotify ended in June after one season of Meghan’s podcast Archetypes. Netflix unveiled its first trailer for the series on August 16.
It comes after Netflix paid £3million for the film rights to Carley Fortune’s romantic novel Meet Me At The Lake which Harry and Meghan will produce for the service.
During the new Invictus series, Harry talks in a segment about post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and trauma in warzones, giving insight into his own experiences.
Speaking on a video call as shown during the third episode of Netflix’s Heart of Invictus, which aired today, the Duke of Sussex, 38, thanked former soldiers for their work
The third episode of the show saw veterans from national teams across the world lay bare the reality of living with their injuries, both physical and mental
He says: ‘Look, I can only speak to me own experience but from my tour of Afghanistan in 2012 flying Apaches, somewhere after that there was an unravelling.
‘And the trigger for me was actually returning from Afghanistan but the stuff that was coming up was from 1997 from the age of 12. Losing my mum at such a young age, the trauma I had I was never aware of.
‘It was never discussed and I didn’t really talk about it and I supressed it like most other youngsters would have done When it all came fizzing out I was bouncing off the walls – what is going on here? – I am now feeling everything instead of being young.
‘The biggest struggle for me was no one around me really could help. I didn’t have that support structure, that network or that expert advice to identify what was actually going on with me.
‘Unfortunately like most of us the first time you consider therapy is when you are lying on the floor in the foetal position probably wishing you had dealt with some of this stuff previously. And that’s what I really want to change.’