Prince William and Kate Middleton are taking a page from the Sussex book when it comes to their royal duties this year. Most of 2024 saw Prince Harry and Meghan Markle on what royal “experts” called a “professional separation,” as they went about their respective endeavors separately. Now the Prince and Princess of Wales are following suit.
According to the Daily Mail‘s royal editor Rebecca English, the future king is scheduled to go on a “handful of solo foreign visits in the coming months,” leaving his wife behind to take care of their three children, Princes George, 11, and Louis, 6, and Princess Charlotte, 9. Kate has reportedly resumed with doing the school drop-off, taking the children to tennis lessons and play dates, and has even gone back to the gym to regain her strength.
But these are reportedly short overseas visits, three days at most, so William won’t have to be away from the family extensively. It’s said that “everyone is adjusting the dial” given Kate’s ongoing recovery from cancer and to ensure both parents can still spend quality time with their children.
A royal insider explained that “what they are working on is ways they can balance themselves as parents with being the Prince and Princess of Wales.” But don’t expect the princess to resume a full course of official duties anytime soon, as staying cancer-free remains her focus, per her comments in her video message last year.
Instead, she will make a gradual return to public duties and that there aren’t any plans yet “for any full-scale foreign royal tour” for Kate. But she is allowed to join William in any of his short trips should she feel up to it. A source said it’s about pace for the princess, who would rather choose to confirm only when she is sure she can attend events, instead of getting anyone’s hopes up and then pulling out at the last minute.
“There is no huge reset button that’s going to be hit in January. What we will actually see is a slow continuation of the Princess balancing her recovery and her public-facing duties, as she outlined back in September,” the royal insider shared adding that Kate’s cancer journey has certainly impacted the family’s recent decisions over the last year to make sure that their “children continue to be at the center of their universe.”
Royal author Ingrid Seward added that while Kate obviously wants to support William and the monarchy, she wants to do so in “a way that it doesn’t take her away from the family too much.” She said the cancer has made the Royal eager to “prioritize her family even more, because they are the future.”
“Kate knows there is a looming, massive responsibility coming, but she can’t do anything about that, so she just needs to make sure that the family she’s bringing up are able to deal with it. It must have been very difficult for her to deal with her family and her illness at the same time, and she obviously realizes that the children have been through a hard time too,” she said.
Interestingly, Kate and William’s calendar this year bears a glaring resemblance to Harry and Meghan’s last year, when the Duke of Sussex did most of the foreign visits while his wife stayed home with their two children. But the difference is that Kate’s is for health reasons, while the Duchess did so to finalize the launch of her Instagram page and her With Love, Meghan Netflix series.
