Charles Spencer recalls painful moments after Diana's untimely death

Charles Spencer is sharing what his original eulogy for Princess Diana was like.

The 9th Earl Spencer, 61, appeared on the October 24 episode of Gyles Brandreth's Rosebud podcast and revealed that the original eulogy he prepared for his sister's funeral was "very different" from what he ultimately read.

"I flew back [to the U.K.] – I was living in South Africa – I flew back from Cape Town overnight. [I had a] very sweet stewardess help me, because I was in bits," he said.

At first, the Earl looked for someone else to give the eulogy, but did it himself when he couldn't find anyone who’d be right for it.

"I had a big, thick address book, and I thought, 'I want to find someone who's going to make the speech for her.’ And I got to 'Z' and I hadn't found anyone," Spencer recalled.

He recalled, "[I] got off the plane in Heathrow [Airport], called my mother, I said, 'I can't think who's going to give the eulogy. And I've got an awful feeling it's going to have to be me. And she said, ‘Well, it is going to be you. Your sisters and I have decided it.' "

Sharing what that eulogy was like, he said, "[It was a] very traditional eulogy, almost … 'She was very good at this as a child' and all that. And then I thought, 'Well, this is ridiculous, that's not who she was.' "

Spencer then "realized” that he had to "speak for" Diana, not about her.

"And I knew I'd been left at that stage – it had no legal standing – but I knew she'd left me as guardian of her sons," he continued, referring to his nephews, Prince William and Prince Harry.

"Obviously, the other parent being alive, that meant nothing, but it meant something to me," said Charles Spencer. "That sort of duty, I think. And then I wrote it in an hour and a half and, yeah, that was it, really."

Princess Diana died in a car crash in Paris in 1997.