Born in Uccle, Belgium, she is the daughter of Count Michel François de Selys Longchamps and Countess Pauline Cornet de Ways-Ruart. In 1962, she married Jacques Boël, a well-known industrialist and nephew of René Boël. In 1968, Delphine Boël was born, allegedly from an extramarital affair with the Albert of the Belgium, not the king yet back then. The purported affair was made public in 1999.