Kate Middleton gave a subtle tribute to fellow cancer patients in her emotional video announcement.
On Friday, March 22, the Princess of Wales announced she has been diagnosed with an unspecified type of cancer and is currently undergoing preventative chemotherapy treatments following her January hospitalization.
In the video, Middleton sits on a bench alone outside Windsor Castle while addressing her medical condition. Shortly after the announcement, people noticed a row of yellow daffodils blossoming in the background behind the princess—many cancer organizations around the world use the daffodil as a symbol of hope for people who have been diagnosed with various types of cancer.
As People reported, the flower blossoms in the spring and "signals rebirth and new beginnings," as well as "resilience and reassurance, as it returns during the same time each year."
The royal family has been under intense scrutiny and at the center of seemingly endless conspiracy theories after Kensington Palace announced the princess had undergone a planned abdominal surgery in January.
Scrutiny intensified in March, when the palace released what was later found to be a digitally altered image of the princess posing alongside her three children. Major news outlets pulled the doctored image from circulation, and the palace issued a statement from Middleton, who apologized for photoshopping the image.
The bombshell announcement video came one week before the princess was scheduled to make her first public appearance in months, during Easter service at St. George's Chapel in Windsor Castle. It is now understood that the princess and her family will skip the service altogether.
At the end of her video announcement, the Princess of Wales said that as she continues treatment she is "also thinking of all those whose lives have been affected by cancer."
"For everyone facing this disease, in whatever form, please do not lose faith or hope," she said. "You are not alone."
After sharing her diagnosis, the princess received a sweet message from Mila Sneddon, an 8-year-old girl who was diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia when she was 4. Sneddon first met the princess in 2020 and the pair have maintained a friendship ever since.
“She will be brave because I was, and she will fight it like I did,” Sneddon told The Mirror. (Sneddon has been cancer-free for two years, according to the outlet.)
“(The princess) is a mom, a wife, she is young, beautiful, athletic and she is facing this," Sneddon's mom, Lynda, added. "It shows cancer doesn’t discriminate, it can affect anyone at any time. We wish her a peaceful and speedy recovery.”
