The royal family is under some serious questioning and facing suspicion from the public after recent events keep stacking up against them in their favor. Following the death of Queen Elizabeth II in September of 2022, the royals have been on a bit of a bumpy road. King Charles III has since taken over the throne as of May 2023. January 17th of the following year, Buckingham Palace announced that His Majesty was diagnosed with cancer and will start to undergo treatments. Shortly after on the same day, Kensington Palace announced that Kate Middleton, future Queen of England, had already undergone abdominal surgery, a planned surgery and according to her representatives the Princess of Wales was able to have a smooth recovery and will continue her recovery time in private. A representative for Kate announced that she will be “unlikely to return to public duties until after Easter.” (People.com). To add more chaos to January 17th, Prince William, future King of England, announced a pause on his royal duties in order to be at his wife’s side as she recovers and also attempt to have some normalcy for his three children. William was seen the following day driving to the hospital to visit Kate, shortly after Kensington Palace announced that Kate’s surgery had gone well. William drove himself to the hospital, and was seen in the early afternoon going to visit his wife. This may seem like standard medical chaos given the condition of royals discussed, so what is the big deal? Many people have grown suspicious of Kate’s disappearance from the public, given her sudden surgery and William pulling out of appearances and turning down events to the public. With Charles undergoing treatment, Kate recovering from surgery and William stepping out of the spotlight to be there for his wife, the British monarchy is left with an empty figurehead, as the next in line, George, is only 10 years old and is unable to fulfill the public duties expected of whoever has the crown. So, where has Kate been and why is William stepping back?

After nearly six weeks with no updates about the Princess of Wales’s whereabouts, the Palace released a follow-up statement following the online circulation and worried about how Kate is doing and if she is just recovering, or if something greater is going on. X, formerly known as Twitter, started to spread rumors and talk about possible scenarios in terms of where the Princess has been. On it’s trending page, users of X could see “#WhereIsKate” was gaining more popularity as the time passed. This resulted in an additional press release from Kensington Palace, in which they reminded the public that Kate was not advised to return to public duties until after Easter, but reassured the antsy public that Kate was “doing well” [Cosmopolitan].  While the public was able to find some ease in this statement, many admitted that William’s pulling out of public appearances, including a memorial service for his Godfather, King Constantine of Greece. This caused many people to feel that something greater is going on with the Princess, as royals missing family events (especially memorial services for death) is very unlikely unless there are dire circumstances out of one’s control. So the question still stands, where is Kate and is the public aware of the truth?

The British Monarch serves zero purpose in reality. They have few duties in government and serve merely as a figurehead more than anything. A majority of the job of the royal family is to serve the public and represent themselves and their family in public outings. With King Charles undergoing his treatments, William is next in line for the throne and therefore supposed to take on the duties of the King when he is unable to do so. Charles did similar events for his mother, Elizabeth, towards the end of her reign. William stepping out of public appearances leaves the royal family without representation in many major events, including awards, volunteer work and even other family/extended friendship events. Many people are starting to believe that Kate is undergoing another struggle, in terms of her physical and mental health. The average recovery period for an abdominal surgery is about 6 weeks (if all is smooth and goes according to plan), but some people say that it can take up to 6 months to feel like themselves again. Many people are starting to believe that the public is overreacting to the Princess’s absence, but are led on to believe something greater is happening because William has been less present to the public in recent outings. My friend, who is a superfan of the royals admits that she does like to look at the memes on X and have a good laugh, it is important to remember that Kate “is a person who is probably going through some sort of physical or mental challenge and wants/needs/deserves privacy”.  Many people tend to forget, whether they like Kate and the royals or not, that Kate is a person and has a right to privacy like the rest of the world does. 

Time will only tell if Kate is truly healthy and doing well, as Easter is on March 31st, which falls about 6 weeks after the announcement of Kate’s surgery. Hopefully following this holiday, once the family is typically seen at Church on, the public will be able to feel at peace about the Princess and focus their attention to King Charles and his battle.