I have cancer like Kate Middleton – please stop calling us ‘brave’

I was really interested in seeing Kate Middleton in public on Saturday after learning she was tired from her cancer treatment.

I was diagnosed with breast cancer in February and am also undergoing chemotherapy. As a result, I’ve put 2024 in brackets – I’m missing my daughter’s last sports day and her last elementary school concert. I expect the Princess of Wales to make similar sacrifices. My heart aches for any pressure she may have felt to appear in public and be “brave” about things.

In fact, I’d go so far as to admit that some of the media coverage surrounding Princess Kate this weekend made me really, really angry. One commentator wrote that Kate appearing in public as part of the Trooping the Color exhibition was “selfless”, the “tonic Britain needed” – and praised her for mustering forces to do it while “lesser mortals” would have stayed at home.