Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, is sharing what it's like being told she should be "so lucky" that her husband, Prince Harry, "chose her" to be his wife.
In the latest episode of her new "Archetypes" podcast, titled "The Stigma of the Singleton," Meghan interviewed comedian and writer Mindy Kaling on her experience as a single mother and her decision to start a family on her own.
Inquiring about Kaling's second memoir, "Why Not Me?" Meghan asked why she chose the title, relating it back to her own experience with Harry.
"When I started dating my husband, we became engaged and everyone was just like, 'Oh my God, you’re so lucky he chose you,'" she said, adding that "at a certain point, after you hear it a million times over, you’re like, 'Well, I chose him too.'"
The 41-year-old continued, explaining that she's grateful her husband countered the narrative with, “They’ve got it all wrong. I’m the lucky one ‘cause you chose me.'"
"But it’s, it is gendered and it’s archetyped and it’s stereotyped that…'you’re so lucky.' And it just feeds into this idea that you’re waiting for someone to tell you that you’re good enough, as opposed to knowing that you’re good enough on your own," she said.
The former "The Office" actor said her memoir's title refers to two things, the first being career ambition in her professional life. "Why can’t I go from No. 12 on the call list on 'The Office' to being No. 1 in my own show? Why not?" Kaling said.
"We get to live life one time. Right? And many people have overcome odds bigger than that. So, like, why not at least try?" she continued.
Kaling admitted the second meaning is "a little bit more vulnerable to talk about," which deals with the concept of not being with the right significant other.
"Like, why am I not the person that got married?" she asked, adding, "I’m still examining it. It makes me emotional."
The "Never Have I Ever" creator later said that, despite being so different from him, she has a great relationship with her dad, saying "he is everything to me." She expressed that having a dad would be "so valuable" for her kids.
"It wasn't ... our family's lot in life. And I do think about it with wistfulness and then also fear like will — what will they think when they get older about that?" Kaling added.
This podcast episode isn't the first time Meghan has spoken about her family and relationship with Harry. In June, the former "Suits" actor opened up about her experience with suffering a miscarriage a year before welcoming her now 1-year-old daughter Lilibet, who is second-born to their 3-year-old son Archie.
“I know what miscarrying feels like, which I’ve talked about publicly,” she said in a Vogue interview with journalist Jessica Yellin and activist icon Gloria Steinem, alluding to her 2020 op-ed in The New York Times. “The more that we normalize conversation about the things that affect our lives and bodies, the more people are going to understand how necessary it is to have protections in place.”
The interview came in wake of the Supreme Court overturning landmark 1973 decision Roe v. Wade, which ensured the constitutional right to abortion.
“I think about how fortunate I felt to be able to have both of my children,” Meghan said.
“I know what it feels like to have a connection to what is growing inside of your body,” she recalled of her previous pregnancies. “What happens with our bodies is so deeply personal, which can also lead to silence and stigma, even though so many of us deal with personal health crises."
