Parenting is tough... even Kate says so!
THE Duchess of Cambridge admitted ‘parenting is tough’ as she met young mothers battling emotional problems yesterday.
She may have a full-time live-in nanny and a mother who gives her plenty of help with lively Prince George, three, and Princess Charlotte, 20 months, but Kate confessed it still wasn’t easy bringing up a young family.
The duchess, who wore a blue Eponine coat on her first official royal engagement of the year, was speaking as she visited the Anna Freud Centre’s Early Years Parenting Unit in Holloway, North London, of which she is patron.
She visited the unit to learn more about its work with families who have children under five that are at risk of being taken into care.
After listening to the stories of one group of mothers who have been through a treatment programme to help them grapple with problems such as familial abuse and addiction, the duchess, 35, said she felt for them.
‘Parenting is tough,’ she said. ‘And with the history and all the things and the experiences you’ve all witnessed, to do that on top of your own anxieties, and the lack of support you also received as mothers... I find it extraordinary how you’ve managed actually. So really well done.’
She heard one mother describe how she had been trafficked from Nigeria and had not wanted her son, now six, when she was pregnant but now has a much improved relationship after coming for treatment when he was three.
‘I got depressed really badly,’ she said. ‘I needed help because I was trafficked to this country.’ Kate listened to another mother, who had her first baby when she was 17, describe how she had her first four children taken away from her because she came from a ‘really bad family’ and had no support.
Later she met parents taking part in a ‘theraplay’ session that helps the child-parent relationship.
The visit was the latest in a series of royal engagements for the duchess designed to draw attention to child mental health issues. She is a champion of early intervention and working with the whole family to resolve problems with children.