People Are Surprised Meghan Isn't Joining Harry In England––Are You All Brand New?

Vanity Fair has published a typically breathless piece, rife with insinuation, about how Duchess Meghan Markle won’t accompany Harry to England next month. Apparently Mama Diana’s sixtieth b-day’s a-coming, and there’ll be somber ceremonies, speeches, and a statue unveiling: all the things a postpartum mom, a barely two-year-old toddler, and a squalling newborn love. Chuck in family drama with Prince William speaking separately from Harry and Duchess Kate lurking — Duchess Kate whose facial expressions clearly communicate that she can have a man murdered execution-style, and it wouldn’t matter, because she’s Duchess fucking Kate. Stir in Prince Charles, with whom Harry’s relationship is reportedly “strained” after the bombshell Oprah interview, and have we all forgotten, especially on Diana’s sixtieth birthday, that Daddums married his goddamn mistress?!

You have to feel for Queen Elizabeth. Even as “The Crown” looks less and less like fiction and more and more like “The Real World: Buckingham Palace,” dealing with these people must be like forcing entitled rich-ass snobs to give a shit about actual people and shake hands with icky commonfolk. Oh, wait. That’s exactly what it’s like. She’d rather be tramping around Balmoral in tweed and snarfing marmalade, but she’s spent a lifetime playing damage control for her ungovernable spawn. Duchess Meghan does not need to step into this particular pile of steaming dogshit again. Not for Diana, not for Harry, not for Queen or country or even Oprah.

Duchess Meghan shouldn’t go back to England. Ever. But to her credit, ditching this trip probably has nothing to do with Harry’s batshit family. In case you’ve been living under a rock in Siberia without internet access, Duchess Meghan and Prince Harry welcomed baby Lilibet Diana on June 4th.

Pause for cooing over American royal baby! Pause for more cooing over American royal baby named after the Queen and Princess Diana! It’s all very exciting, seriously. Everyone loves a royal baby, an assurance the monarchy’s boot will remain on the throat of the common man. Royal babies can be forced into ornate Christening gowns and officially sanctioned commemorative china, which your grandmother will buy and display prominently. No word on if the Duke and Duchess will continue those traditions or toss them onto the ash-heap of royal bullshit they’ve jettisoned.

But having a baby is hard. No matter how rich you are, if you carried it, you can’t pay someone else to push it out of your vagina. Not that Meghan would try. She’s Not Like Them. Deep down, Duchess Meghan is a mom like most of us: stitched-up, leaky-boobed, probably wearing a messy ponytail and crying about something while she nurses a newborn and tries to entertain a toddler at the same time. We’ve been there. Duchess Meghan, fist-bump of Scary Mommy solidarity.

Who travels internationally in that condition? Much less mid-pandemic? Is anyone seriously shocked that Duchess Meghan has chosen to bow out of this particular trip? Maybe she’d rather not nurse a screaming newborn through takeoff while she prays her two-year-old doesn’t get COVID-19 and cries about enduring Duchess Kate’s lizard-like glare. Harry may be a bit of a royal space cadet (he probably still hasn’t seen the inside of a Target), but he’s shown himself to be a devoted husband, and clearly, he’s not making his wife travel back to that den of sin and iniquity he calls his family.

Moreover, Duchess Meghan has struggled with mental health issues before. These people have patently ignored them. She courageously called them out. (Pause for another Scary Mommy fist-bump of solidarity.) Why, oh why won’t she haul her postpartum body across the pond at a time when she’s most vulnerable and caring for a two-year-old and bonding with a newborn? Maybe she wants to preserve her precious shards of postpartum mental health. No one’s in a stellar headspace a month after they have a baby. They’re definitely not in an emotional state to throw on some Prada heels and enter a staring contest with Kate fucking Middleton, master of death glares. Avoiding this trip to England straight-up saves Duchess Meghan’s sanity.

Then there’s the tabloids.

Tabloids love to hate postpartum bodies. English tabloids love to hate Duchess Meghan. If she steps over to the British Isles, it’ll be open season on her, her body (especially as compared to Kate’s), and her Blackness, because British tabloids are about as racist as an Alabama Klansman and just as sophisticated. No one should expose themselves to that particular flavor of fuckery — especially when they’re prone to fits of weeping as is. Which Duchess Meghan probably is. We’ve been there. We’ve cried because we thought we’d literally go insane from sleep deprivation. At that particular juncture of her life, that poor child doesn’t need some old white men busting on her “mummy tummy.”

Here’s what Duchess Meghan needs. Hopefully she’s listening.

Stay. In. Bed. If you have enough resources to do it, do it. We would’ve, but we had to clean the stove and shit. You don’t, so get your royally married ass in that king-sized bed. Stick Lili in there with you. Flick on some trashy-ass TV (not “The Crown,” you might have flashbacks). Have your peeps bring Archie in on the reg and play with him, while you stay in bed. Like, read him books or whateverthefuck.

If you chose to breastfed, do it on demand. If you chose to bottle-fed, do your thing. No shame, no pressure. Enjoy your cute scrunchy baby. Do not cave to an American public who feels somehow entitled to pics of your little Lili. (Dream of sending out pics of your middle finger instead. Do not do this.) Do not feel shamed for avoiding a trip to England. Kiss Harry goodbye, and if you don’t actively hold a grudge that he’s ditching you a month postpartum, you’re a better woman than me. I know — needs, family reconciliation, blah blah.

Like every new mom, you’re doing the best you can. We know why you’re staying home, honey. You’re doing a fantastic job. Pause for another fist-bump from all your Scary Mommies. We’ve been where you are. And we wouldn’t go to England, either.