Prince William Struggles With ‘Immense’ Pressure as Kate Middleton and King Charles III Fight Cancer (Exclusive)
Finally, the royal family had something to smile about. On Thursday,April 11, Prince William and his 10-year-old son, Prince George, attended a soccer match at Villa Park stadium in Birmingham to cheer on their favorite team, Aston Villa. The father-son duo stood and clapped throughout the game, which ended with a 2–1 Aston Villa victory.

It was a well-deserved reprieve for William. In the past few months, the stoic future king has had to contend with an onslaught of personal and professional hardships after both his wife, Princess Kate Middleton, and his father, King Charles III, were diagnosed with cancer within weeks of each other. With two of the most high-profile royals sidelined, William, 41, has been pulling triple duty, filling in for Kate and Charles during official appearances while also keeping things going at home with George and his younger siblings, Princess Charlotte, 8, and Prince Louis, 5, as their mom goes through preventive chemotherapy
There’s a lot on his plate. “It’s been stressful,” a source exclusively shares in the latest issue of Us Weekly. “William feels a profound sense of duty to uphold the monarchy’s stability and inspire confidence in the public that everything will be OK. It’s an immense responsibility.”

It’s no secret the monarchy is currently in crisis. Since taking the throne after the death of Queen Elizabeth II in September 2022, Charles, 75, has seen his plan to slim down the monarchy backfire. According to royal historian Gareth Russell, “It was always anticipated that Charles would have three working siblings and two working children and their wives, and that would be a sustainable footing.”
There are gaping holes in what was once a robust royal lineup. Prince Harry, 39, and his wife, Meghan Markle, 42, famously fled the U.K. — and their royal duties — to start a new life in Montecito, California, in 2020; in 2022, Charles’ disgraced younger brother, Prince Andrew, 64, was stripped of his military titles and patronages after he was sued by a woman claiming he sexually assaulted her in the early 2000s. (The new Netflix film Scoop, starring Gillian Anderson, covers Andrew’s disastrous 2019 BBC interview in which he casually downplayed his friendship with late convicted pedophile Jeffrey Epstein.)