Prince Harry and wife Meghan Markle, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, are expecting their second child together since their marriage nearly three years ago.
The couple is “overjoyed” to be welcoming a new child, a spokesperson for the family confirmed to NBC News on Sunday. Harry and Meghan’s first child, a son named Archie, will turn 2 in May and is seventh in line to the throne. Their charitable foundation, Archewell, is named after their son.
The announcement comes after Meghan revealed she suffered a miscarriage in July, writing about the loss in a New York Times opinion article. “Losing a child means carrying an almost unbearable grief, experienced by many but talked about by few,” she wrote.
After Archie’s birth in 2019, Harry spoke to reporters at a press conference, smiling happily, outside the couple’s former home, Frogmore Cottage.
“It’s been the most amazing experience I can ever possibly imagine,” Harry said. “How any woman does what they do is beyond comprehension, and we’re both absolutely thrilled.”
He has spoken emotionally about fatherhood since his son’s birth, telling frontline workers last year during an Easter video call that he’s spent his coronavirus isolation savoring time with Archie.
“There’s a hell of a lot of positives that are happening at the same time and being able to have family time — so much family time — that you almost think, ‘Do I feel guilty for having so much family time?'” Harry said. “You’ve got to celebrate those moments where you are just on the floor rolling around in hysterics.”
Meghan has also spoken openly about the struggle of undergoing media scrutiny during her pregnancy and following Archie’s birth in an interview with London’s ITV News in 2019.
“Look, any woman, especially when they’re pregnant — you’re really vulnerable,” she said. “So that was made really challenging. And then, when you have a newborn, you know?”
Her interview resonated with many mothers, who supported Meghan online and shared their own memories regarding the stress of new motherhood.
The couple has made numerous moves to protect their privacy since the birth of their son, including stepping back from their duties as members of the royal family and moving out of England.
Markle also won a privacy suit Thursday against Associated Newspapers — the publisher of the Mail on Sunday and MailOnline — for publishing excerpts of a letter she wrote to her estranged father, Thomas Markle.
Judge Mark Warby wrote in a ruling that Meghan “had a reasonable expectation that the contents of the letter would remain private,” and the articles had “interfered with that reasonable expectation.”
