Prince William, Princess Kate forced to shatter royal plans, reorder priorities
Being a member of the royal family might be an honour as it is often perceived as a privilege, but behind the crown jewels and ceremonial fanfare lies a reality that is far from glamorous.
The senior royals have to make lots of efforts to keep balance between their royal duties and personal life as the weight of tradition and expectation rests heavily on the shoulders of those who wear the crown.
The recent crisis within the royal family clearly explained that how they had to struggle during the tough time, with the future monrach stepping back from royal duties to focus on parenting during his wife’s cancer treatments.
The Prince and Princess of Wales were forced to change their plans and reordered their priorities.
“Behind the scenes, for William it was brutal,” Russell Myers, author of “William & Catherine: The Intimate Inside Story” told the Manchester Evening News.
According to the expert, William felt like “the rug had been pulled from under him” after his wife, Princess Kate, and his father, King Charles, were both diagnosed with cancer early in 2024.
William’s priorities were to manage all these emotions at that time.
“Over all of this was his deep concern for his three children. And I think by seeing him step away from public duties, it tells you a lot about William and Catherine as people, because it’s always been family first for them,” the expert said.
He went on to explain, “Duty is important to them, but it has to come second in respect to their family, because if they get the family right then everything will follow.”
“When Catherine went in, he was fairly resolute,” said a close aide.
“‘They both very calmly told the children what was going on and how long Catherine would need to be away for, but explained other than that everything would continue as normal and when she came home, she would need to rest up for a bit.’”
Myers wrote that Catherine kept in touch with her family while at the hospital through video calls, “catching up on what George, Charlotte and Louis had been doing at school and asking if ‘Papa’ had been able to cook for them while she had been away.”
The Princess was contacted by her medical team at the London Clinic, where she had her abdominal surgery, and told they had discovered cancer was present.
“The advice was an immediate course of preventative chemotherapy in order to give her the best chance of a full recovery,” Myers wrote.
Kate was caught completely in shock, however she remained composed. Her first thoughts were of her children and her husband, according her friends.
“The duty is important to them, but it has to come second in respect to their family because if they get the family right then everything will follow,” wrote Mayers.
After telling their children, Kate decided she needed to make a public statement about her cancer, believing her “experience could benefit others in similar distressing circumstances.”
She made the shocking announcement abother cancer daignosis while sitting on a bench surrounded by flowers on March 22, 2024.