If you have something to say...
Say it on the Huffington Post
If you have something to say...
Say it on the Huffington Post
So that's her secret. With just weeks to go before the birth of the most anticipated baby on the planet since... Blue Ivy, I've discovered how Kate Middleton has been keeping her pregnancy curves in check, and had the nation swooning.
A while ago, the French magazine Closer sparked a fierce debate by publishing controversial images of Kate Middleton. This entire controversy does bring up some interesting questions. Where do we draw the line between freedom of press and the right to privacy?
News of Kate Middleton's pregnancy was received with fear and trembling by tabloid offices country-wide. This was largely because she was suffering from morning sickness, which is relentlessly unsexy. Glowing pregnancy is lovely: bokey, bed-ridden pregnancy is not.
With the Duchess of Cambridge now in her final trimester, the UK is anticipating the arrival of a new future monarch this July. There has never been a better time to give birth. Really, I'm not just offering that as a platitude, the customs and advice relating to pregnancy and birth in the past make for horrific reading. Of course, the lack of hygiene and gynaecological understanding caused untold suffering but setting mortality rates aside, midwives and the fashionable male accouchers of the past had some strange ideas about what was best for their patients.
There are a lot of people betting a lot of money on the name of the future Royal Baby - and after considerable research, I have worked out how to beat the bookies. No, not just beat them. Absolutely cane them. We hope.
London now suffers more countries-per-monarch than any other city in Europe. This economic burden is just one of many constitutional injustices our head-of-state inflicts upon her subjects. So why did support for the monarchy reach a record high in 2012?
Kate is Duchess of Cambridge, but is it then a given that she should have to share with the world every spit and cough, medical issue and scan 3D picture with the world?
Let's coin a new term for the Royal Twins. Let's call them... The Pwins (Trademark pending). What if these twins happened to be a healthy little boy - and a healthy little girl... And now - the last and most wondrous step of all: What if the babies were delivered by Caesarean Section?
Monarchies codify the superiority of a man to a woman. A king always outranks a queen - a man always outranks a woman. The highest position in a royal house may never be occupied by a woman because the highest position is that of king, which is reserved for a man.
As we enter seven or eight months of closely monitoring the Duchess of Cambridge's progress with her pregnancy, we should remember one vital thing: This pregnancy is happening to a father too.
The celebrity media's role in bringing a previously obscure maternal condition to the forefront of popular culture - just imagine the pub quiz questions to be mined from hyperemesis gravidarum's Wikipedia entry this week - carries important implications for health communication.
Does it matter - in the slightest - if our future King is not a dish? Does it matter if Prince William is not up there with the rest of the Euro-hunks like Prince Felipe of Spain or Prince Haakon of Norway?
Fertility rights are hugely important. But what's happening in (nee) Middleton's middle shouldn't be up for public discussion. It's fantastic that another royal is on the way but it would be even better if the press could stop the speculation on how it's gestating for the next half year.
If we follow the precedent of other recent Royal babies, such as Viscount Severn and Lady Louise (the Prince & Countess of Wessex's two children), William and Catherine's child will be given a title a day or so after the birth. Buckingham Palace will now be thinking of options for the child, but it will remain a secret until after the birth.
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