Torn Kate: Will the duchess follow her heart?
Your instinct is to stand by your family and friends in times of crisis. But is our future Queen struggling to choose between her head and her heart?
When your friends are in trouble and your family is in turmoil, your natural instinct is to rush over and offer words of advice and a shoulder to cry on. Unless, perhaps, your destiny is to be the future Queen of England.
For 65 years, our current monarch has – in public at least – remained neutral and kept her thoughts, even on family matters, to herself. And, bearing in mind she has to maintain a similar decorum, the matter of how to deal with the problems besetting the Royal Family must surely be concerning the Duchess of Cambridge.
With the situation with her family becoming more awkward by the day, Meghan must be feeling the strain. And, as a newcomer to The Firm, the new Duchess is said to be increasingly turning to her sister-in-law, Kate Middleton, for support.
Royal expert Phil Dampier says, ‘Kate has grown very close to Meghan and they speak almost every day on the phone. She will be supporting her 100 per cent and will feel Meghan’s anguish.’
Meghan’s relationship with her father, Thomas, seems to be unravelling under the glare of the world’s media. Just last week, he revealed he has not heard from his daughter since the day after she married Prince Harry, 33, in May. Next, he accused her of having ‘a sense of superiority’ and said it might be better for all concerned ‘if I die’.
Harry is reportedly exasperated at the controversy that continues to surround his new wife.
As well as Meghan’s father (who maintains he ended his last conversation with the pair by putting the phone down on Prince Harry), her half-sister, Samantha, is washing the family’s dirty linen in public. She has named Meghan the ‘Duchess of Nonsense’ and even suggested Harry should have married his ex, Cressida Bonas.
For Kate, her sisterin-law’s embarrassment must be an uncomfortable reminder of what can happen when you marry into the Royal Family and the eyes of the world turn upon you. She has had her own problems, after all, with one colourful relative – her mother’s brother, Kate’s Uncle Gary. He is notorious for antics supposedly conducted in the Ibiza villa nicknamed La Maison de Bang Bang, and has been implicated in taking part in wild parties and drug use.
‘She will be thanking her
lucky stars that she has such a supportive family herself in her mum Carole, dad Michael, brother James and sister Pippa,’ continues Phil.
‘Her family is in stark contrast to Meghan’s, so she’ll feel very sorry for her and will want to help her. Kate will also tell Meghan from her experience of the press that, eventually, these media storms blow over and she’ll be able to get on with her life.’
But how far will Kate Middleton feel she can go in supporting a woman who, like her, joined the Royal Family and felt the critical gaze of the media on her and her own family? Of course, the focus on young royals is very positive when they become parents. ‘Kate will be telling Meghan how wonderful it is to have children of her own, and she will be encouraging Meghan to start a family as soon as possible,’ says Phil. Despite reports that her mother is moving to the UK, Meghan, 37, must be feeling isolated at the moment. But what, really, can Kate do? The Queen, 92, who has called Kate ‘trusty’ and ‘well-beloved’, has spent years providing Kate with an example of how a Queen behaves. In the same way that the Queen hasn’t spoken out on family matters, Kate has remained silent on her uncle’s behaviour. And no matter how much sympathy she has for Meghan, we can understand that Kate must, above all, be bound by royal protocol, especially as her husband will one day be King, as will her son. Perhaps another show of public togetherness, such as the two Duchesses’ Wimbledon outing last month, would send an indirect message that Kate has Meghan’s back. No doubt Harry would be grateful for such a gesture. But the question remains: how high, if at all, will Kate stick her head above the parapet for Meghan – or will she, like the Queen, keep her head down and hope these media storms passes quickly? Only time will tell.