Before the royal titles, global headlines, and millions of admirers, she was merely a young girl reheating microwave meals and contemplating her place in the world.
Born to a Black mother and a white father in Los Angeles, this girl did not grow up feeling like a Hollywood narrative in progress. In reality, she frequently felt out of place — neither in school groups, nor in beauty ideals, nor even in the assumptions made by strangers regarding her family.
“My father is Caucasian and my mother is African American. I am half Black and half white,” she once expressed.
However, this is all part of her narrative that has influenced everything — from her self-perception to the resilience she had to cultivate when the world eventually began to take notice.
Raised on TV dinners and tough questions
In her youth, Meghan Markle referred to herself as a “latchkey kid,” returning to an unoccupied home while her parents were engaged in long work hours. Her mother, Doria Ragland, earned a living as a makeup artist, while her father, Thomas Markle Sr., was employed in the television industry.
“I was raised on a diet of fast food and numerous TV tray dinners,” she remarked.
“Watching ‘Jeopardy!’ and consuming a variety of microwaveable meals designed for children… that was the norm.”
Nonetheless, there appears to be some contention regarding the true nature of Meghan’s upbringing. Her father has disputed his daughter’s narrative, asserting that her recollections — particularly concerning her eating habits during childhood — do not align with his own memories of those times.
He also asserted that he personally collected Meghan from school each day, or arranged for a car to pick her up if he was preoccupied.
What truly impacted Meghan during her formative years were the incessant glances and inquiries whenever she and her Black mother ventured out in public.
A mother with dark skin
Meghan recounted that many individuals presumed she was a Caucasian woman, which prompted some to question how she could have a mother with dark skin, who once remembered being mistaken for the nanny in public.
“I distinctly recall my mother narrating stories about taking me to the grocery store and a woman asking, ‘Whose child is that?’ She responded, ‘It’s my child.’ ‘No, you must be the nanny. Where is her mother?’” Meghan stated.
Following her parents’ separation, Meghan was nurtured by both until she reached the age of nine. Subsequently, her father assumed the primary caregiving responsibilities while her mother concentrated on advancing her career.
Meghan lived with her dad full-time until she left for college at eighteen.
Her mother relocated to a predominantly Black community situated outside the Valley. The transition was quite abrupt — however, she discovered her support system within a close-knit group of women who assisted in her upbringing.
‘We had a wonderful network of women who genuinely supported me in raising Meg. She was always so easy to connect with, friendly, and adept at making friends. She was an exceptionally empathetic child, very mature,’ Doria mentioned in one of the episodes of Meghan’s Netflix series.
Nevertheless, their relationship was not always conventional.
“I recall asking [her] if I felt like her mother,” her mother reminisced, “and she responded that I felt more like her older, controlling sister.”
”I was not the pretty one”
For Meghan, her teenage years were characterized by the same insecurities that many individuals experience — though hers were intensified by her sense of being an outsider.
“I was quite the nerd during my childhood,” she admitted. “People often fail to recognize that aspect of me. I was not considered the attractive one. My sense of self was deeply intertwined with being the intelligent one.”
She harnessed that intelligence from a young age. At the age of 11, she boldly took on a sexist television advertisement. Even then, her writing abilities were akin to a superpower.
In spite of financial hardships, even the smallest pleasures felt extravagant.
“I grew up enjoying the $4.99 salad bar at Sizzler,” she reminisced. “I was acutely aware of the effort my parents put in to make this possible… and I felt fortunate.”
Meghan Markle is seen in unearthed family photos illustrating idyllic, happy childhood – far from modest upbringing she claimed, Duchess's cousin Shawn Johnson reveals https://t.co/41b5VXt2L6 pic.twitter.com/HLFeDKNAiQ
— Daily Mail (@DailyMail) February 19, 2024
As a Girl Scout, during significant celebrations, my troop would often dine at the same salad bar or The Old Spaghetti Factory, as those were the options within the financial means of those families.
However, circumstances shifted when her father won $750,000 in the lottery. Her half-brother remarked that this windfall played a crucial role in guiding Meghan towards the determined path she would eventually pursue.
“The funds enabled her to attend top-tier schools and receive exceptional training,” he stated. “She is relentless in her pursuit of her goals.”
Early hustle, Hollywood dreams
From a young age, Meghan harbored ambitious dreams. At the age of 11, she penned a letter to her principal, vowing to elevate their school to fame once she achieved success.
She was serious about her aspirations. By the time she turned 13, she had taken on various jobs, ranging from babysitting to selling donuts at a stand named Little Orbit. Her dedication to work was unwavering.
During this time, she developed a passion for acting while spending time on the set of Married… with Children, where her father served as a lighting director.
“It was quite an amusing and unconventional environment for a young girl in a Catholic school uniform to grow up in,” she remarked with a laugh.
However, teenage Meghan was still in the process of discovering her identity.
”I wasn’t black enough”
“My teens were even worse — grappling with how to fit in,” she wrote in a blog post years later. “Being biracial, I fell somewhere in between.”
She also faced challenges early in her acting career, partly because she was seen as “ethnically ambiguous.” As she put it, “I wasn’t black enough for the black roles and I wasn’t white enough for the white ones.”
By her twenties, the pressure to look and act perfect took its toll.
“It was a constant battle with myself… to be as cool/as hip/as smart/as ‘whatever’ as everyone else.”
At 33, though, things shifted.
“I am 33 years old today. And I am happy,” she wrote. “To figure out how to be kind to yourself… to feel [happiness] — it takes time.”
From Suits to St. George’s chapel
The young girl who once felt unnoticed would eventually evolve into Rachel Zane on Suits, and later — Meghan, Duchess of Sussex.
She encountered Prince Harry in 2016. Two years afterward, they exchanged vows at Windsor Castle. By 2021, they were blessed with two children: Prince Archie and Princess Lilibet.
However, the experience of being a royal mother was not devoid of daunting challenges.
A postpartum ordeal
In April 2025, Meghan initiated her podcast, Confessions of a Female Founder. During her inaugural episode, she disclosed a little-known fact: a life-threatening health crisis following childbirth.
“We both had very similar experiences — although we were unaware of each other at that time — regarding postpartum,” she shared with Bumble founder Whitney Wolfe Herd. “We both experienced preeclampsia. Postpartum preeclampsia. It’s exceedingly rare and incredibly frightening.”
“In the stillness, you are still striving to be present for others — primarily for your children — yet those situations represent significant medical emergencies.”]} }}
Whitney agreed: “I mean life or death, truly.”
Meghan endured. However, shortly thereafter, she experienced another personal tragedy — a miscarriage, which she subsequently revealed in a heartfelt essay.
From quick-service meals to royal commitments, Meghan Markle’s narrative is far from a fairy tale — it presents a genuine, unfiltered depiction of a woman who struggled to carve out her identity in a society that continually attempted to confine her.
Now, with a microphone in her grasp and two children alongside her, she is sharing her narrative — on her own terms.