Therapists are skilled at helping others navigate grief, but what happens when the grief they encounter is their own? In August 1997, Julia Samuel had been working as a counsellor for families grieving the loss of a child for several years when her close friend Princess Diana died in a car crash. {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"ImageObject","caption":"Julia Samuel with Princess Diana at Wimbledon in 1994.
Photo: @SpokenEdition/X","url":"https://img.i-scmp.com/cdn-cgi/image/fit=contain,width=1024,format=auto/sites/default/files/d8/images/canvas/2024/08/27/d17fe513-991d-46f6-9d0e-3d218b428923_07d3c8e3.
jpg"} Julia Samuel with Princess Diana at Wimbledon in 1994. Photo: @SpokenEdition/X “I remember clearly the shock I’d felt when she died,” Samuel shared with Time Magazine back in 2018. “The pain and subsequent fury of missing her and wanting her back.
” Twenty-seven years later, Samuel has become a leading figure in bereavement counselling in the United Kingdom, per The Guardian. In 2016, she was even appointed Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) for her service. What else do we know about the late Princess Diana’s close friend? She hails from a privileged background {"@context":"https://schema.
org","@type":"ImageObject","caption":"Julia Samuel in 2020. Photo: @juliasamuelmbe/Instagram","url":"https://img.i-scmp.
com/cdn-cgi/image/fit=contain,width=1024,format=auto/sites/default/files/d8/images/canvas/2024/08/27/3cd02a2e-8e14-42d4-ba10-10ae1fb14f82_f9dd6e0d.jpg"} Julia Samuel in 2020. Photo: @juliasamuelmbe/Instagram Born on September 12, 1959, in London, Samuel grew up privileged.
Her father, James Edward Alexander Rundell Guinness, came from – you guessed it – the Irish family known for its dry stout beer, as well as banking. Her mother, Pauline Vivien Mander, came from an influential Midlands family. Although Samuel and her three older sisters, along with her twin brother, were raised in comfort, they were also taught to maintain a “stiff upper lip”, according to her interview with The Guardian.
It wasn’t until she married Michael Samuel of the Hill Samuel banking family at the age of 20 and became a mother of four that she began to reflect on her own parents’ struggles with addiction. At 27, she attended an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting with a friend and discovered that expressing one’s true feelings could be crucial in overcoming personal struggles. “Now when I look back, I think I wanted to do this work because of all the unexpressed loss of my parents,” she said in the 2022 Guardian interview.
“But it took me a long time, and quite a lot of therapy to work that out.” She’s known as a grief counsellor {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"ImageObject","caption":"Julia Samuel with her book, This Too Shall Pass.
Photo: @juliasamuelmbe/ Instagram","url":"https://img.i-scmp.com/cdn-cgi/image/fit=contain,width=1024,format=auto/sites/default/files/d8/images/canvas/2024/08/27/acde629c-6d5e-4812-a1d9-af5ea8f5ad04_6ba8f77a.
jpg"} Julia Samuel with her book, This Too Shall Pass. Photo: @juliasamuelmbe/ Instagram At 31, Samuel became a bereavement counsellor at St Mary’s Hospital’s paediatric department. As the hospital’s first counsellor for families dealing with the death of a child, she played a key role in founding Child Bereavement UK, a national charity dedicated to supporting families and training professionals who offer help when a child dies or is bereaved.
After 25 years at St. Mary’s, Samuel began working with terminally ill adults and later launched the Grief Works app, designed to assist the bereaved in navigating their grief. She now works as a psychotherapist specialising in grief, per Child Bereavement UK’s page.
The widower of murdered British MP Jo Cox turned to Samuel before breaking the news of her death to his children, according to The Guardian, and the same outlet reported that Samuel is also thought to have helped Meghan Markle through a difficult time in her pregnancy, though neither has confirmed this. Her friendship with Princess Di {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"ImageObject","caption":"Princess Diana with Julia Samuel.
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jpg"} Princess Diana with Julia Samuel. Photo: @princessdibooks/X Samuel continues to feel the impact of her own losses, including the death of Princess Diana 27 years ago. Samuel and Diana met at a house party when Samuel was 29 and Diana was 27, developing a close friendship that included sharing school pickups.
The friends would often go to the gym, have lunch or visit the cinema together, and they could also be spotted in the royal box at Wimbledon or backstage at an Elton John concert. “I had a photograph of Diana and me on my desk, and sometimes I would stroke it and smile at the lovely memory. Other times, I’d put it in my sock drawer, too angry that she was gone,” Samuel shared with Time Magazine.
“I both hated looking at the newspapers covering her death, but also could not resist looking at her beautiful face, those soulful eyes. It took months for me to really believe she died. My grief over her death is less intense now, 20 years later, but it is not gone.
” Samuel is now one of seven godparents to Prince George , the eldest child of Prince William and second in line to the British throne. “I really love my godson, George. And it’s a lovely way of loving her,” she told The Guardian.
Samuel was born into the Guinness family – famous for making it big in the banking and brewing industries – and befriended Princess Diana at a house party when they were in their 20s Now godmother to Prince William and Kate Middleton’s son Prince George, she is believed to have helped Meghan Markle through tough times during her pregnancy too.
