Last week, the British media marked the one-year anniversary of the Princess of Wales’s cancer announcement video. I wouldn’t have thought that one of the worst moments in Kate’s life would need some kind of commemoration, but here we are. Not only were commemoration articles written, it looks like Kensington Palace also organized a special briefing to Becky English at the Daily Mail. English had this big exclusive: “Story of Kate’s cancer battle: A year ago the Princess made her unprecedented announcement. Now for first time Rebecca English tells how Kate fought back from ‘battering’ of cancer.” This piece includes some new information as well as a great deal of sugar-coated revisionist history. Some highlights:
William & Kate are in a better place now: It’s clear that after a tumultuous 12 months, William and Catherine are, happily, in a ‘much better place’. ‘It’s actually lovely to see how far they have come,’ says a friend.
Kate’s priorities: Her health remains her priority – a diet packed with healthy antioxidants, trips to the gym and generally being outdoors, particularly with her family, as much as she can…. Perhaps just as telling has been the sight of William cheering on his beloved Aston Villa, or out on manoeuvres with the Mercians in Estonia this week. There’s a sense of normalcy regained. ‘I don’t think many have seen them happier,’ one insider observes.
Kate still won’t make plans to come back to work full-time: ‘As cancer survivors will tell you, the recovery is still hard. Her health really took a battering last year. I can’t stress that enough, however well she looks now,’ a source emphasises. There are no plans yet for any major foreign visit, for example – although aides are keeping an eye on the situation. ‘For the time being it’s steady as she goes. There’s no change of course from what’s previously been suggested, which is a slow and steady return to royal life,’ another insider adds.
Kate’s abdominal surgery in January 2024: Such a lengthy hospital stay (the Princess was a patient at the London Clinic for two weeks) was highly unusual, they said, and had sparked much debate in their own staff room. In truth, I already had an inkling that it was much, much worse than Kensington Palace had let on. Indeed, the week before the Princess’s broadcast [in March], this was confirmed to me by a very well-placed source, who stressed how serious they believed her condition had been in the run-up to her surgery. Another contact also revealed that the increasingly upset and frustrated couple were considering issuing a public statement.
Kate’s statement last March: I am told that the Princess wrote every single word of her 371-word statement herself, without any advice from her press office at Kensington Palace. ‘They were absolutely her personal words, it was her story and she wanted to share it,’ a source says. Another adds: ‘It was powerful and all the more so because it came so personally from her. Only she was in a position to truly get across how she was feeling. The Princess also wanted to make sure whatever she said reflected the experience of the many others around the world who get the same, life-changing diagnosis too. That was something only she was able to share with them.’
Controlling the narrative: The fact that this was followed up with two further personally penned and recorded messages in June and September – plus a message on social media in January revealing that she was happily in remission – only cements how determined she and William are to continue to tell this story in the way they see fit. On one hand this is down to the couple’s sometimes admittedly overarching determination to ‘control the narrative’. As public figures, dependent on public finances, only time will tell whether this is truly possible to maintain.
Russian bots: Both they and their team were genuinely shaken by the discovery that huge swathes of the rumour and conjecture this time last year was down to the manipulation of Russian ‘bots’. Excellent research last year by the BBC revealed how security investigators believed a Russia-based disinformation group deliberately amplified and added to the frenzy of social media conspiracies about the Princess’s health. In the weeks leading up to her video message there was a notable surge in online rumours and often wild claims about her health, they said, which added to the already unbearable emotional pressure on the couple. An analysis of the data showed ‘hallmark signs’ of a co-ordinated campaign (apparently sharing and adding to false claims is easier to do and harder to track than starting misinformation from scratch), presumably with the aim of destabilising the Royal Family, who are seen as a force for unity in the UK. ‘It was already a crazy time but what the couple and their team didn’t realise at first was that the Russians were feeding the algorithm,’ a source tells me.
As someone who covered Kate’s months-long disappearance and all of the craziness around it, I have no doubt that “Russian bots” were amplifying certain storylines/theories. But… saying “oh, Russian bots were behind it all” is another version of whitewashing the very real crisis for the royals last year, and it’s a way of absolving William and Kate of responsibility for their immaturity as public figures and their clownish, slapdash damage control and outright lies. A huge chunk of the crisis was of Will and Kate’s own making, from their refusal to give considered and truthful updates on the future queen consort’s medical situation to their catastrophic decision to release a manipulated photo as a health update for Kate. Normal people, regular old royal-watchers and regular old gossips were talking about the story and trying to figure out what the hell happened. Even by English’s own admission, the speculation was everywhere from January through March 2024.
As for this new storyline that William and Kate’s marriage has never been stronger NOW, and that this is the happiest they’ve ever been… yeah, I don’t know. I do think that whatever happened in the past sixteen months or so, some kind of all-encompassing deal has been worked out with regards to living situations, work schedules, the reentrance of the Middletons into society and whether Kate will ever wear a tiara again.
Photos courtesy of Kensington Palace, Avalon Red, Cover Images.
