Princess Diana

Diana Frances Spencer was a very wealthy, yet normal, girl growing up in England. Although she was a little different, she was her own person and always spoke up for herself and never let anything get in her way. She loved to do her own thing and would always wear whatever she wanted, no matter what other people thought or said. Her parents divorced when she was six years old, after which she was raised by nannies. This was very hard for her and was probably part of the reason she struggled all throughout high school. She moved in with three other young girls during college. She soon found her true calling, working with kindergarten children. She absolutely loved them; they, in turn, adored her.

Diana, whose aunt was a friend of the royal family, first met and played with Prince Charles when they were children. The next time Diana saw Charles, he was dating her sister, but Charles quickly turned his attention to Diana. Soon they were seen everywhere together. Reporters started following her everywhere she went and she was suddenly thrust into the spotlight of England. She was not used to getting so much attention and it created so much pressure on her that it started to have a bad effect on her. She didn’t know it at the time, but her life would never be the same again.

When Charles proposed to her she said yes and they were soon married in what was called the wedding of the century. Diana was very nervous about the wedding but thought it was no big deal. She desperately wanted her marriage to work because she came from a divorced family and she tried to do everything to make it succeed. As a princess, Diana suddenly had royal duties to attend to such as dinners, banquets, and trips, which was all very hard for her. She saw the first sign of problems on her honeymoon when Charles wore cufflinks with two interwoven c’s. The initials stood for Charles and Camilla, his mistress and long time secret love. Whenever Diana asked Charles about Camilla he would always say that they were just good friends and that Diana shouldn’t worry.

Diana’s personality took a terrible turn. She was no longer the same happy person, but started falling into a deep depression. She could not cope with anything and had violent mood swings. She also started to suffer from the eating disorder of bulimia nervosa. These were all cries for help, including when she threw herself down a flight of stairs when she was pregnant with her first son, William. No one recognized that she was in trouble. Everyone in the royal family ignored it because they were not the kind of problems that happened in their family.

Diana’s children brought her a great amount of happiness. Prince William was born on July 21, 1982, and Prince Harry was born in September, 1984. Despite the happiness she felt from having children, she suffered from postpartum depression.

Royal business became the most horrid thing for Diana. She started to leave parties early to retire to bed, and eventually stopped attending all together. Her marriage to Charles started to fall apart. They went for days without speaking to each other and rarely even touched or kissed each other. Camilla’s presence was ruining the marriage and Diana’s relationship with her own siblings also started to fail as they constantly argued and fought. The media speculated about them separating and soon lawyers were discussing it also. When Diana and Charles finally separated, she moved into an apartment that was part of the palace and started her new life as being the separated wife of the Prince of England.

Diana’s public life was beginning to strain her. Everything going on in her life was too much for her to handle so she took a break from her charity work and made her children the first priority in life. When they could not be with her, it made her very sad and depressed. One Christmas she sat all by herself, eating and reading a book.

Speculation about Charles’ relationship with Camilla became public. He did a television show and announced that they were just friends and that the reason his marriage to Diana failed was because it was too difficult for her as an outsider to marry into the royal family. Diana and Charles both wanted their children to be safe from the bad effects all of this could have on them.

Diana started to live her life again. She was finally free of the conformity and tradition that she never got along with. Everybody wanted to see her and the media took more pictures of her than of Charles. She had a hold over people and could make anything look good on her. Some say that she filled the role of princess as no other British royal ever had. She liked spending time alone reading, listening to music, and spending time with her children. Diana wanted to be the queen of people’s hearts, not the queen of England.

Diana Started doing an enormous amount of charity work. She was associated with over 150 charities and was president or patron of at least 90 of them. She was patron of the National AIDS Trust and helped thousands of people see what kind of work they were doing. In doing so, she raised lots of money for the AIDS cause. As president of the Royal Marsden NHS Trust at the London cancer hospital, she kept up search and the spirits of patients. She helped raise money for many different children’s funds and hospitals and enjoyed using her name as a way to get attention for good causes. In recognition for her charity work, Diana won a Humanitarian award in 1995. She traveled to many countries to help with the fight against AIDS and to raise money. She also greatly cared about the problem of land mines in Angola and often worked with the Red Cross. Diana helped many people and loved using her name to generate publicity on their behalf. She was a true humanitarian.

Diana was finally happy with her life. She over came all of her struggles in life. So many people face struggles like these and look to her for inspiration. She was helping other people, spending lots of time with her children, she had a boyfriend, and she was finally divorced in December, 1995. She was finally her own person and finally had the love and life she deserved.

Diana’s happiness would not last long. The day after she got back from a cruise with her boyfriend, Dodi, they went out to dinner. On the way back from the restaurant, their car got into a terrible accident. Diana suffered severe injuries including a broken leg. Diana Frances Spencer died the next day at the age of thirty-six.

Diana’s seemingly fairytale life ended far too soon. She never got to complete all of her life’s work, even though she did more in fifteen years than most people do in a lifetime. Diana’s impact on people still lives. She saved many people’s lives while saving her own. She was an amazing woman for helping so many people while she still had so many problems she had to deal with herself. The world mourned her death but still keeps her memory alive. She is a legend and will never be forgotten. The Princess is finally at peace.