Inside Prince Harry's Transformation From Spare Heir to Devoted Dad of Two

Meghan Markle needn't wrap anything up ahead of Prince Harry's milestone birthday Sept. 15. 

Because to hear the royal tell it, he already has all that he needs to happily celebrate his big 4-0. "The best gift I've ever been given is, without a doubt, my kids," he recently revealed in an email interview with People. "I enjoy watching them grow every single day, and I love being their dad."

His tiny presents—5-year-old Archie and 3-year-old Lilibet, prince and princess now that Grandpa King Charles III has assumed the throne—were behind his motivation to cut ties, first with the institution when he and Meghan announced in 2020 they were stepping back from their duties as senior royals and then, largely, with Harry's family as a whole.

Although the prince has made it clear that he hasn't given up hope for a future reconcilation with his dad and brother Prince William. 

Nor was it his intention to carry on without his famous fam when he and Meghan decamped from their Windsor Castle digs to an equally palatial 18,000-square-foot Montecito, Calif. home. Or when they began speaking their truth—in a bombshell-laden sitdown with neighbor Oprah Winfrey, then their 2022 Netflix docuseries and finally his 2023 memoir Spare.

As Harry put it to ABC News' Michael Strahan in an interview ahead of his book's release, with "everybody who has a large family, a family that you've been born into, there becomes a point when the family that you've created...becomes the priority over the family that you were born into."

In other words, he said, the choice to leave "was very hard. But that was my thinking and the process in which I went through."

And now that they're free—if not from the fishbowl-like existence he's likened to "living through a soap opera," at least the endless rules they were expected to follow as members of The Firm and the general unease Harry felt in the U.K.—they intend to make the most of their oceanside existence. 

"We've got our family," Harry told Oprah in their 2021 sit-down. "We've got the four of us and our two dogs, and it's great."

It tracks, then, that their brand of world-changing involves their tiny heirs. 

"Our kids are young," Meghan told CBS Sunday Morning's Jane Pauley in an Aug. 4 interview, that coincidentally aired on her 43rd birthday. "They're amazing. But all you want to do as parents is protect them."

Hence the inspiration for their new Archewell Foundation initiative, The Parents Network, which aims to help caregivers navigate the wilds of social media. 

"As we can see what's happening in the online space," the Suits alum continued, "we know that there's a lot of work to be done there and we're just happy to be a part of change for good." 

Well-versed in the impact the nastier parts of the Internet can have, "We've got to the point where almost every parent needs to be a first responder," Harry added. "And even the best first responders in the world wouldn't be able to tell the signs of possible suicide. That is the terrifying piece of this."

Particularly so for Harry, who watched his wife struggle with her own sucidal ideations—his greatest fears coming to pass after watching his mother Princess Diana struggle mightly with the overwhelming attention she received. 

"My biggest concern was history repeating itself, and I've said that before on numerous occasions, very publicly,” he explained to Oprah, referencing his mom's tragic 1997 death, following a terrifying high-speed car chase through a Parisian tunnel. “And what I was seeing was history repeating itself, but more, perhaps—or definitely far more dangerous, because then you add race in and you add social media in."

And though he and his bride remain popular targets on social media—their every move either praised or pointedly criticized—they've done their best to live a normal-ish existence in their California digs where their little ones "make us laugh," Harry said on Good Morning America in February, "and keep us grounded every single day, like most kids do."

And more work trips like their three-day tour of Nigeria this past May remain on the horizon. 

"It is hugely important for us to meet directly with people, supporting our causes and listening, in order to bring about solutions, support and positive change," Harry explained to People. "There's only so much one can do from home and over Zoom, so we look forward to traveling more because the work matters."

Take the GEANCO Foundation-sponsored mental health summit Meghan attended at the Lightway Academy in Abuja, telling students in attendance that she saw her own image in them. 

"It's what we see in our own children," Meghan said, "to give them that promise and excitement for their futures."

As for the couple's approaching months, they're looking bright, with plans to celebrate Harry's birthday first privately at home and then with friends at an unnamed international location. 

"I was anxious about 30, I’m excited about 40," Harry told the BBC in a statement on Sept. 13. "Whatever the age, my mission is to continue showing up and doing good in the world."

And as they look ahead to their future, we're looking back at just how far Britain's onetime spare heir has come.