Meghan Markle’s strained connection with her father has drawn significant media attention in recent years. The father-daughter pair remain out of contact, with the Duchess of Sussex reportedly restricting her father’s access to his grandchildren due to an ongoing family rift.

Meghan Markle, now a part of the British Royal Family through her marriage to Prince Harry, shares two children with him. While she maintains a close bond with her mother, Doria Ragland, her relationship with her father, Thomas Markle, took a different turn, resulting in a well-publicized estrangement.

Despite the current distance, Meghan and her father once shared a warm relationship. In a 2021 interview, Thomas shared his own emotional memory of his daughter’s birth in 1961, noting that he was the first to hold her. “I fell in love with her and I’d been that way for 40 years,” said the Pennsylvania native who has two older children from his first marriage.

Meghan also reflected on her childhood in an essay for Elle magazine and revealed her parents met in the late ’70s. Her father worked as a lighting director for a soap opera, while her mother was a temp at the studio.

After marrying in 1979, the couple moved to an affordable, tree-lined neighborhood in L.A.’s San Fernando Valley. Despite the close-knit bond she shared with both parents in her early years, Meghan’s family life shifted when her parents divorced in 1987.

As she grew up, the public figure pursued a career in acting, eventually crossing paths with Prince Harry. Yet, in the midst of her rising success and high-profile relationship, her father made a mistake that would later contribute to the strain in their relationship.

Amid Meghan and Prince Harry’s engagement in 2017, Thomas faced health issues, including a heart attack just days before the wedding in May 2018. He shared that stress, partly due to his eldest daughter’s public remarks about Meghan, worsened his condition.

Thomas revealed he hadn’t heard from Meghan since news broke that he wouldn’t attend the wedding, though he felt her mother was a good choice to her walk the down the aisle. After a brief stay at a hospital in Mexico, he expressed concerns about his health, fearing he might suffer another heart attack.

Later on, just ahead of the wedding, Thomas’s daughter announced in a statement from Kensington Palace, “Sadly, my father will not be attending our wedding.”

In his absence, King Charles III ultimately walked Meghan down the aisle when she married Prince Harry. Reflecting on this act, Thomas expressed his appreciation to the King, saying, “I certainly couldn’t have asked for a better replacement. Although, I would love to have done that.”

The father of three missed the wedding following backlash over staged photos he sold to a photo agency. He explained that he hadn’t intended to harm Meghan or the Royal Family, but was frustrated with paparazzi who had repeatedly caught him in unflattering situations, often misrepresenting him.

Thomas divulged that he had declined high-paying interview offers since Meghan started dating the prince. He accepted a smaller fee from a photo agency, hoping the images would improve his public image. However, he later admitted the photos looked “stupid and hammy” and expressed regret over his decision.

Thomas’s secret collaboration with a British paparazzo for staged photos caused embarrassment for the Royal Family ahead of the wedding, especially after Prince Harry’s earlier pleas for media restraint.