'Lowest I've ever seen': Prince William's difficult time after Kate Middleton and King Charles' cancer diagnoses

Prince William's former royal aide, Jason Knauf, who appeared on 60 Minutes Australia on Sunday, February 23, made a big revelation about the difficult time Kate Middleton was diagnosed with cancer. Jason Knauf worked as an aide for the Prince and Princess of Wales until 2021 and described the period as "awful" when Prince Charles was also diagnosed with cancer around the same time.

Having two family members suffering from a major life-threatening disease was one of the most difficult times for Prince William. In the video clip, Jason Knauf can be heard saying, "If you're Prince William, you find out that both your wife and your father have cancer," adding, he said, "And that is — I mean, I couldn't believe it."

Jason Knauf made the big disclosure about Prince William's feelings after learning about cancer diagnoses of two of his close family members "within a couple weeks."

'Lowest I've ever seen'

Describing an "awful" phone call with the Prince of Wales regarding his wife's cancer diagnosis, Jason Knauf said, “Absolutely awful. It's the lowest I've ever seen him.”

He noted certain issues and highlighted the emotional strain after the cancer diagnosis was made public. "But the problem was that all this crazy, sort-of conspiracy theory stuff kicked off in the background online — 'Was she really ill?' But they didn't want to say yet that she had cancer because they hadn't told the children and were still working through how to tell the children," Jason Knauf added.

In March 2024, Princess of Wales announced that she was undergoing cancer treatment. In September, just a few months later, she revealed that she had completed chemotherapy. This year, in January Kate shared that she was focusing on recovery and was in “remission”.

During the interview, the former aide further shared what Prince William discussed the most in the early years, Jason Knauf suggested that the Prince of Wales talked about “how he and the princess were going to prepare their children for life in the public eye." He made these remarks while referring to the difficult childhood Prince William made his way through.