Prince Harry may have received more than $100,000, along with a share of subscription income, for his 99-minute MasterClass on grief.

In the online seminar, the Duke of Sussex gave an emotional account of losing his mother, Princess Diana, and discussed his battles with depression and feelings of uselessness after Megxit.

A source close to Harry urged people to watch the class before judging it, telling the Daily Mail that he should not face prolonged criticism for “speaking from the heart”.

Harry’s spokesman confirmed that he was paid by MasterClass to appear in Redefining Grief: Building Resilience Through Loss, but declined to provide further details. The San Francisco-based platform features celebrities and leading figures who teach pre-recorded classes on their specialist subjects.

According to Forbes, MasterClass instructors can receive an upfront fee of at least $100,000 (£75,500), as well as 30 per cent of subscription revenue generated by their courses.

Harry appears as a co-instructor alongside American neuroscientist Dr Mary-Frances O’Connor. Together, they aim to help viewers “discover new ways to process grief and loss so you can find your way back to you”.

The full lecture is available through a MasterClass subscription costing between £10 and £19 a month. The technology company is valued at $2.75 billion.

Royal reporter Tom Sykes said a source close to Harry argued that nobody had the right to judge how he had coped with losing his mother at the age of 12. The source described Harry’s conversation with Dr O’Connor as an honest discussion of his life and family.

Previous MasterClass instructors have included Martin Scorsese, Gordon Ramsay, Serena Williams and Hillary Clinton.

During the interview, Harry said he became depressed and felt “useless” soon after Megxit. He also said he now avoids spending more than ten days away from Meghan and their children.

In a video released yesterday, the Duke claimed that life inside the Royal Family prevented him from properly grieving for Diana. He said his official responsibilities also triggered panic attacks.

Harry, 42, said putting on a shirt and tie for royal engagements often made him feel as though he were being strangled or suffocated.

“You would think I had the best help in the world. I’m a prince, for God’s sake, but I was still grieving and didn’t have any place to put those feelings,” he said, adding that he carried those emotions for “15 or 20 years”.

Harry said therapy eventually helped him. He also recalled the striking moment when spraying himself with Diana’s perfume unlocked memories and emotions he had kept buried.

In the MasterClass video, Harry said he had found happiness with Meghan but “slipped into depression” after they left royal life and Britain.

“We moved to Canada to get some space away from everything and simply think,” he said. “Within two or three days of leaving that stressful environment, I experienced an adrenaline crash unlike anything I’d ever felt before.”

“It was as though I needed stress for my brain to function. I became useless around the house. I slipped into depression for about two weeks and felt like I couldn’t function without adrenaline.”

His candid discussion of mental health and PTSD came as Meghan returned to the public eye for the first time in years, wearing a £28,000 outfit for afternoon tea with Malala Yousafzai in London.

Six years on from Megxit, the Sussexes are parents to two children, Archie and Lilibet, and are back in the UK again. The children have started school in the Cotswolds.

And Harry now says that he follows a strict ‘ten-day’ rule to protect his happiness. 

He said: ‘The biggest factor for me is the energy, joy and happiness I get from being with my family, especially our children, and from being on the ground doing my work.

‘The key to maintaining that balance is spending no more than ten days away from my wife and kids.

‘It’s about balancing my work and sense of purpose with being a dad and a husband.’

Harry revealed he did not cry for almost 20 years after his mother’s death and thinks of her ‘pretty much every night and then most mornings’.

A therapist encouraged him to find Diana’s perfume in an effort to unlock his grief after he had forgotten what her voice and laugh sounded like.

The Duke said doing this had a remarkable effect on him and his grief, claiming the scent brought back memories and emotions that had long been suppressed.

‘It was like being transported to another time,’ Harry said. ‘It unlocked everything that had been locked away. 

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‘Spraying my mother’s scent was almost like knocking certain bricks through so that I could see through and certain memories and experiences could start seeping back.’

In the very personal MasterClass episode Harry also said: ‘Everything I do, everything I put my energy towards, I hope that my mother will be proud of.

‘Trying to continue and protect her legacy, what I didn’t realise was that the work I was drawn to was so similar to the work she was doing.’

Speaking to Dr O’Connor ahead of World Mental Health Day on Saturday, Harry added that after marrying Meghan and becoming a father, he often felt guilty about allowing himself to be happy.

The interview comes weeks after the publication of his uncle’s memoir about Diana, which reignited debate about her legacy and included claims that angered the King.

Earl Spencer claimed in one angry phone call Charles told him Diana would soon be forgotten after she died in Paris in 1997.

Reflecting on his mother’s death, Harry said: ‘I didn’t cry when I was told my mum died, only at her burial, and then not again for nearly two decades.

‘I was convinced that was strength, but it wasn’t. It was a 12-year-old boy with no permission to fall apart and no roadmap for how to heal.

‘I’d spent so long emotionally numb because I felt disloyal and guilty at the possibility of being happy without her. I felt I had to stay sad and emotionally shut down to prove I missed her.’

Harry has explained how therapy transformed his outlook, saying: ‘The reality is that what I discovered was that she just wanted me to be happy.

‘That was a huge mental shift for me. It freed me and gave me a completely different outlook on life.’

Harry also said that joining the Army gave him a sense of purpose.

‘For 15 or 20 years, when people asked, “Are you okay?” my answer was always, “I’m fine.” It was numbness. It was emotional shutdown.

‘Without realising it, adrenaline was driving me. It was the force that led me to join the military at 20. It was the perfect distraction.’

The Duke said he increasingly withdrew from his friends and social life during those years, explaining how he ‘was much more comfortable sitting at home’.

Harry added that he struggled to find help at first.

‘Unfortunately, a number of general practitioners weren’t equipped to help me. It was a case of receiving advice or being offered a pill.

‘I was completely against taking medication. I followed the advice but it wasn’t making any difference, so I kept searching for something that would work.’

He described his deployment to Afghanistan as life-changing.

‘The things I saw and experienced appeared to trigger other traumas that had been stored within me,’ he said.

Harry said therapy eventually gave him the ‘permission to grieve’.

‘Sitting in a room with a complete stranger and having the confidence and trust to open myself up,’ he said.

The Duke, who in his book Spare admitted taking a number of illegal drugs in his life, praised psychedelic-assisted therapy – a type of treatment that has split doctors.

Magic mushrooms, MDMA and ketamine are used to change the brain rather than treat symptoms of depression and PTSD with common anti-depressants.

He said: ‘To combine conventional therapy with modern day medicines breaks down those walls and those barriers to be able to open yourself up and go deeper than you would ever dare to go.

‘Psychedelic assisted therapy is no longer a fringe idea or thought. It’s really becoming, I think, mainstream.’

It’s about tide!

After a two-year hiatus, New York City’s only swim-bike-run race is returning Saturday under a new name: the Big Apple Triathlon. About 1,300 endurance athletes are expected to dive in — quite literally, into the Hudson River.

For competitors tackling the longest course, the challenge begins with a swim of nearly one mile along the shoreline. They’ll then bike 25 miles on the West Side Highway before running 6.2 miles through and around Central Park.

The event, previously known as the New York City Triathlon, dates back to 2001. Its more recent chapters, however, have been marked by scheduling problems, extreme weather and repeated changes to the course.

“I believe every edition since 2017, we either had to shorten the run, shorten the bike or cancel the swim,” former race director Alex De Gracia of Life Time told the Post. His organization sold the race in 2023.

The 2019 race, then held in the summer, was canceled because of dangerous heat. Water-quality concerns eliminated the swim in 2021 and 2023, forcing athletes into a run-bike-run format. In 2022, temperatures forecast to reach the 90s prompted organizers to cut the bike and run distances by at least half.

Then, before registration even opened for the 2024 event, organizers called it off. A move to the fall was intended to avoid the worst summer heat, but organizers and city officials could not agree on a workable date. Local triathletes moved on.

Now, with Alpha Win at the helm and an early-fall date on the calendar, the starting horn is set to sound once again. Roughly half the field is traveling from outside New York City, and most participants paid between $350 and $625 to compete. They’re hoping this attempt finally sticks.

“I was super excited when I heard about it; I loved the New York City Triathlon,” said Matt Stern, a 32-year-old Manhattan attorney who competed in 2023. He describes the course as “epic.” “I think it’s amazing to be able to swim, bike and run in the city. You train here every day, so to actually be able to race here is awesome.”

Why tri? 

A triathlon combines swimming, cycling and running, typically in that order so athletes begin the water leg before fatigue sets in. The shortest format, known as a sprint, generally covers about 16 miles. At the other end of the spectrum is the famed Ironman, a 140.6-mile race that includes a full marathon.

New York’s event has traditionally been an “Olympic” or standard-distance triathlon, roughly twice the length of a sprint. This year, however, Alpha Win is offering “a distance for everyone,” its motto, with a sprint, relay, aquabike — swim and bike — and duathlon, consisting of a run, bike and run.

“People associate the name ‘triathlon’ with Ironman, and they think, ‘Oh, that’s some crazy goal,’” Stern said. “But I think triathlon is really accessible for a lot of people.” He discovered the sport three years ago after joining his cousin in a sprint race in Montauk. At the time, he could barely swim. Today, he is an Ironman finisher and a member of the Empire Tri Club.

“It’s fun to be able to push yourself, see what you can do, how far you can take yourself, how fast you can go,” Stern said. “And the community around you is what makes it really special.”

The sport draws far more than “just your elite, very, very fit-looking people; it’s certainly a diversified group,” said Tommy Struzzieri, CEO and race director of Alpha Win. The Saugerties, New York-based company has staged more than 200 races since 2010. “That’s why I love standing at the finish line.”

Still, getting athletes to that finish line in New York requires an unusually long list of things to go right.

Weather is the first hurdle. “Racing in the northeast has a very limited window,” said Joel Volterra, a TriLife NYC coach and one of this year’s competitors. Spring water can be dangerously cold, summer air can be oppressively hot and fall brings the unlikely — but genuine — possibility of hurricanes.

The city’s packed calendar creates another obstacle. Organizers must find a weekend day that does not collide with a protest, parade, presidential visit, playoff game or other major event involving local authorities.

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And unlike races in many other places, staging a safe bike course in New York can mean closing a major crosstown route in Manhattan’s most densely populated ZIP code. Securing the swim, meanwhile, may require coordination with the Coast Guard. The event must win approval from city, state and federal agencies.

“You’ve got DOT, you’ve got Parks, you’ve got police, you’ve got emergency services … you’ve got Riverside Park and Central Park, you’ve got all the community boards that are affected,” Volterra said. “So it’s any one of those things or a bad weather event [that] can derail it.”

There’s something in the water — or is there? 

And then, of course, there’s the Hudson. But before anyone talks trash, it’s worth talking tides.

“When people think of a river, they think of a river moving in one direction. That’s not what happens in the Hudson,” said Deanne Draeger, founder of Urban Swim, which hosts open-water swims around the city and advocates for more accessible waterways. 

Rather, what happens in the Hudson — technically a “tidal estuary” — is a series of “tide cycles,” Draeger added. “It’s constantly flowing north and south, and north and south again. So that’s one of the most important things planners have to take into account.” 

As such, this year’s swim route heads north to help participants go with the literal flow. Man-made barges mark the leg’s start and end. 

A “safety flotilla” including 60 lifeguards on paddle boards, FDNY and NYPD boats and other vessels staffed with paramedics and rescue divers will shield the lane from marine traffic and save, if necessary, swimmers in distress.

The Big Apple Tri is “one of the fastest swims [in the sport], but that doesn’t mean we think every athlete is going to be 100% comfortable jumping in the Hudson,” Struzzieri said. “So we have to be prepared for all parts of that process.” 

Indeed, a self-proclaimed beginner triathlete sought comfort from Reddit after signing up for this year’s challenge: “I’m training well for the swim and I’ve done a bit of open water practice but I am not sure that I am really mentally committed to swimming in the Hudson.” 

But despite its radioactive reputation, the river often tests safe enough for swimming, Draeger said. Decades of wastewater improvements and federal regulations have drastically reduced pollution and cut “fecal coliform bacteria” in the New York Harbor by 95% since 1970, one 2007 report showed. 

Since then, investments in the city’s sewage system, as well as efforts from nonprofits like the Billion Oyster Project, have revitalized water quality and ecology further. Without these upgrades, plus careful monitoring, Draeger’s group wouldn’t be able to safely guide about 200 swimmers in open-water events around the local waterways each year. 

“The river isn’t just a pretty view; it’s public space. This is part of the city, which is one of the things that I think is fantastic about the New York City Tri,” said Draeger, who completed it in the past. “It’s an opportunity when people can get in the water, and you have an experience of New York City that’s completely different from anything that you’ve had before.” 

That said, the Hudson is hardly a glacial spring. No one should be diving in outside of an organized event. And, in the wrong conditions, even such contests can present risk. Due to the city’s antiquated sewage system, experts say, heavy rainfall is enemy No. 1. 

“After a big storm, all of the contamination that’s on the city streets from the pets, from the animals, from trash, gets flushed into the catch basins and over land into the water and goes through these outflows that the city is desperately trying to address,” said Volterra, a civil engineer by day. 

But this year — gangrene-free fingers crossed — participants appear to be in the clear. The Department of Environmental Protection has been testing the river for months. Alpha Win has been consulting with an on-site meteorologist for weeks. The sky has stayed dry for days. 

“So far,” Struzzieri said Monday, “so good.” 

For a race that has spent years battling the elements, that’s a promising forecast.

The murder trial of former Massachusetts police officer Matthew Farwell, who is accused of killing his pregnant mistress and staging her death to resemble a suicide, is set to begin after a brief 9 a.m. hearing Friday.

After the jury is seated, attorneys are expected to deliver opening statements. Testimony will then begin with Stoughton Detective Heather Cheever, followed by a local elementary school official.

Federal agents arrested Farwell, 40, in August 2024 over the death of 23-year-old Sandra Birchmore, who died three years earlier.

Prosecutors allege Farwell groomed Birchmore beginning when she was a teenager, maintained a sexual relationship with her for years and killed her after she revealed that she was pregnant. They also accuse him of making her death appear to be a suicide.

Birchmore’s death was initially classified as a suicide. Farwell was later charged after investigations by the department’s internal affairs unit and the FBI.

Federal prosecutors alleged last year that Farwell killed Birchmore to stop her from speaking out after she told him she intended to keep the baby. According to prosecutors, he responded by calling her “the worst person on the face of the earth.”

Although DNA testing excluded Farwell as the biological father of Birchmore’s unborn child, both sides have acknowledged the result. Prosecutors contend Farwell believed he was the father, citing text messages exchanged with Birchmore from Dec. 28, 2020, through Feb. 1, 2021—the day she died.

Prosecutors say Birchmore was enthusiastic about the pregnancy and shared updates with Farwell about her due date, ultrasounds, medical appointments and a planned gender-reveal event.

She was estimated to be between eight and 10 weeks pregnant when she died, about two weeks before Valentine’s Day. Prosecutors say she planned to announce the pregnancy publicly around that time.

Court documents say Birchmore joined the police department’s explorers program when she was 12. Farwell volunteered with the program and is accused of using that position to groom, exploit and abuse her after she turned 15. Farwell was 27 at the time.

Prosecutors allege the sexual relationship continued into Birchmore’s adulthood, including encounters while Farwell was on duty. He is accused of strangling her on Feb. 1, 2021, after learning she was pregnant.

Farwell has pleaded not guilty and has remained jailed since his arrest in August 2024.

Stoughton is located roughly 20 miles south of Boston.

Jury selection was conducted earlier this week.