Today is Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s third wedding anniversary. It’s a day that somewhat lives in infamy for royal watching, but not for a good reason. Three years on, the couple has fled the royal family, established a somewhat shady charity in California and continues to whine and complain about nearly every aspect of royal life and the royal family on the world stage.

How did the joy of a newly married and interracial royal couple went so wrong?

Well, if the reports in March from former staffers are any indication, the trouble started even before the couple got to the big day.

According to testimonies from staff members and reported by The Times London, Meghan quickly gained a reputation in the royal sphere in the early days of her for being demanding and demeaning to taxpayer funded staff members.

One staff member reported to Valentine Low, who broke the story about bullying claims against Meghan, “I had unpleasant experiences with her. I would definitely say humiliated.”

Another staff member was so concerned about spending the day with Meghan, that she told another staffer, “This is why I feel sick.”

Shortly after the couple’s engagement, Meghan ordered her then personal assistant Melissa Touabti to order some embroidered blankets for a shooting party weekend with Harry at Sandringham. As The Sun reported, they weren’t up to the correct standards for the almost duchess and she flew into a rage.

“When they arrived, they weren’t the right shade of red for Meghan and she went mental at Melissa,” a source said.

Touabti, who quit after working for the couple for just six months, and most of the former royal staff members forced to work for Harry and Meghan threatened to quit and were traumatized by their experiences.

Meghan and Harry also came under fire for her $75,000 sheer dress used in their perfume advertisement style engagement photoshoot, which was apparently so unappealing to the queen that she had them do something more traditional that she could display.

Then there’s also the infamous bridesmaid incident, where either one or both duchesses cried. It remains unclear exactly what happened and what the disagreement was actually over, but it could be as simple as a mother suggesting to a woman who is not a mother that it’s better for the kids to wear tights or that Meghan was complaining about Princess Charlotte’s inclusion in the wedding and that her dress didn’t fit. There’s also been rumors floating out there that she called the little princess “fat.”

In only Meghan’s public version of events in the Oprah Winfrey interview was she the offended party, so it’s fairly safe to assume that it was probably just post-partum Catherine, The Duchess of Cambridge, who cried. 

To be the bigger person and to smooth over relations with her soon-to-be sister-in-law, Catherine did attemptto give Meghan flowers as a peace offering, though she was the offended party, only to have the door slammed in her face.

Most of this all occurred before the wedding even happened. It’s clear that Meghan didn’t get her nickname Duchess Difficult for nothing.

Then there was the wedding itself. The over-the-top pastoral message (which is mostly known for its interesting royal reactions), Meghan’s rather creepy smile, the ill-fitting and plain dress, the plain makeup, the hair that fell apart, and perhaps, most bewildering, the overly long veil with every flower from the Commonwealth embroidered on it.

“[Harry was] really over the moon to find out that I would make this choice for our day together,” Meghan told a royal conservator when her dress went on display. “I think the other members of the family had a similar reaction.”

Perhaps, but that’s highly unlikely. The Commonwealth, though an important part of Her Majesty’s legacy, is mostly an economic agreement, it’s not about the royals. Countries want to become part of the Commonwealth because it helps lower-income countries trade with international giants like the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand and Canada. If not for that benefit, only small island nations with no notable head of state would be part of it.

Her emphasis on the veil and explanation demonstrated something incredibly important that would show how the rest of her brief royal career would go: Meghan Markle never really got the royal family, its function or her future role before her wedding.

Though there is no information regarding their reaction to the veil, it’s likely that most of the royal family found her emphasis on it strange. After all, the Queen did do something similar, but with her coronation gown. Does she think she’s going to be queen of the Commonwealth? 

Yes, at the time, she and Harry would have a role in the Queen’s Commonwealth Trust, but they weren’t going to have a large influence.

It was just a sign in what would become a downhill spiral of supposed misunderstandings and Meghan’s frustration that she just wasn’t as important as the rest of the family.

Just three years to the day, the couple are now persona non grata in the U.K., have offended more than half the United States, can no longer use their HRHs, have been stripped of all royal patronages and are officially estranged from his entire family and hers as well, for the most part. 

The question remains, after all this change, chaos and stress, which has been mostly self-inflicted, will they ever be able to make it three more before it all implodes?

Photo from The Daily Express.