Once an insecure teen, now an royal TV star — her near-death experience after childbirth

Before she had royal titles, made world headlines, and had millions of fans, she was just a little girl heating up microwave dinners and wondering where she fit in. Long before Meghan Markle became a possible royal, her story was filled with everyday struggles and questions about where she belonged. Born in Los Angeles to a Black mom and a white dad, she didn’t feel like a star in a Hollywood movie waiting to happen. In fact, she often felt out of place — not fitting in with school groups, not meeting the beauty standards, and definitely not matching the assumptions that strangers had about her family.

“My dad is Caucasian and my mom is African American. I’m half Black and half white,” she once said, pointing out the mix that made her feel stuck between two worlds — not fully fitting into the identity people might expect. But this is all part of her journey, influencing everything from how she viewed herself to the strength she had to find when the world started to pay attention. Growing up on TV dinners and tough questions, Meghan called herself a “latchkey kid,” coming home to an empty house while her parents worked long hours. Her mom, Doria Ragland, was a makeup artist, and her dad, Thomas Markle Sr, worked in television.

“I grew up with a lot of fast food and also a lot of TV tray dinners,” Meghan said. “Watching ‘Jeopardy!’ and having a lot of microwaveable kids’ meals… that was normal.” However, there were arguments about what Meghan’s childhood was really like. Her dad disputed some of her memories, including how she ate as a kid, claiming he picked her up from school every day or sent a car when he was busy. But what really affected Meghan the most was the constant public judgment she and her dark-skinned mom faced.

Many people thought Meghan was a white woman, which led to some awkward questions about how she could have a mom with dark skin. Doria remembered a time when people thought she was the nanny while they were out together. “I just remember my mom telling me stories about taking me to the grocery store and a woman asking, ‘Whose child is that?’ My mom would say, ‘It’s my child.’ And the woman would respond, ‘No, you must be the nanny. Where’s her mom?’” Meghan remembered. After her parents split up, Meghan lived with both of them until she was nine, when her dad became her main caregiver while her mom focused on her career. Meghan stayed with her dad full-time until she went to college at eighteen.

Her mom moved to a mostly Black neighborhood outside the Valley, where Meghan found a great community of women who supported and helped raise her. “We had a nice network of women who really helped me raise Meg. She was always so easy to get along with, friendly, and made friends easily. She was a very caring child, very mature,” Doria said on Meghan’s Netflix show. However, their relationship was a bit different. “I remember asking her if I felt like her mom,” her mother said, “and she told me I felt like her older, controlling sister.”

“I was not the pretty one,” Meghan admitted, honestly talking about the insecurities of being a teenager, which were made worse by feeling like an outsider. “I was a big nerd growing up,” she said. “People don’t understand that about me. I was not the pretty one. My identity was all about being the smart one.”

Even though they had money problems, little treats like the $4.99 salad bar at Sizzler felt special. When her dad won $750,000 in the lottery, that money helped her get into better schools and have more opportunities. Meghan’s early determination and dreams of Hollywood pushed her to write a letter to her principal at 11, promising to make their school famous one day. By the time she was 13, she was working different jobs and discovered her love for acting while hanging out on the set where her dad worked.

As a biracial teenager, Meghan struggled with feeling like she belonged. She later said, “I wasn’t black enough for the black roles and I wasn’t white enough for the white ones,” which made her feel like she didn’t fit into either identity. But at 33, she discovered peace. She wrote, “I am 33 years old today. And I am happy.” She also mentioned, “To learn how to be kind to yourself… to feel [happiness] — it takes time.”

The little girl who once felt like no one noticed her would grow up to be Rachel Zane on Suits — and later, Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, a royal by marriage. She met Prince Harry in 2016 and got married two years later, entering a life that was very different from her old one, filled with royal duties and two kids: Prince Archie and Princess Lilibet.

However, her life as a royal had its challenges. In her 2025 podcast, Meghan talked about her struggle with postpartum preeclampsia — a rare and dangerous condition that can happen after giving birth. “We both had very similar experiences — even though we didn’t know each other back then — with postpartum,” she said. “It’s so rare and so scary.” After getting through that tough time, Meghan faced a sad miscarriage, which she wrote about in a heartfelt essay.

From quick meals to royal gatherings, Meghan Markle’s journey isn’t just a fairy tale. It’s a true story of a woman who worked hard to find her place in a world that tried to limit her — and now, with a microphone and her two kids beside her, she shares her story on her own terms.