Meghan Markle's frustration with the palace stemmed from officials' handling, or lack thereof, of tabloid stories, says a source.

As noted in court documents that surfaced last week as part of Meghan and Prince Harry's lawsuit against a British media company, the Duchess "felt unable to defend herself against media intrusion," during her time as a royal, People reports.

"The go-to position [at the palace] was no comment or to ignore stories, and people actively prevented her from responding to stuff that we knew to be untrue," a source close to Meghan and Harry told the outlet. "That is what she is taking issue with."

Meghan's legal team claimed that the false tabloid stories caused "tremendous emotional distress and damage to her mental health," leaving her feeling "unprotected by the institution and prohibited from defending herself" during her pregnancy with 1-year-old son Archie.

While Meghan may have felt frustrated by the palace's inaction, a royal insider told People that the royal family's history of silence when it comes to news stories stems from their desire to not heighten the situation.

"The palace teams are faced with the difficulty that when things go wrong — particularly on private life matters — quite often any action taken with the media makes it worse," said the source. "It's not that the royal household doesn't want to help — more that they don't want to make it worse by giving a gossipy story more oxygen."

Photo: Getty Images

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