By Page Six | Created at 2025-03-21 16:45:52 | Updated at 2025-04-04 18:39:17
2 weeks ago
Kate Middleton handles her husband Prince William’s “tantrums” by treating him like a “fourth” child, according to a royal expert.
“Occasionally, William has little tantrums and irritations if things aren’t done the way he wants them done [as heir to the British throne],” Tom Quinn claimed to Fox News Digital on Friday.
The “Yes, Ma’am: The Secret Life of Royal Servants” author expressed that Middleton, 43, is “very good at managing” William, 42, in the same manner that she parents their three kids: Prince George, 11, Princess Charlotte, 9, and Prince Louis, 6.
“And so, there’s a joke among the staff that Kate treats William as the fourth because he occasionally behaves like one,” Quinn alleged.
A royal staffer told the writer for his new book that they “don’t know” where William would be without his wife.
“She hasn’t had everything done for her throughout her life, so she calms him down when he gets a bit fractious,” the employee explained. “She says he sometimes has to be treated as her fourth child!”
A former aide told Quinn that both William and his father, King Charles III, “get irritated very quickly,” as they are used to having things done for them and are therefore “very picky.”
“People who have everything done for them from childhood tend to be rather spoiled and prone to bouts of irritation because they have no idea how much work is involved in washing and ironing, polishing and sewing when they have never done any of it themselves,” the second source said in “Yes Ma’am.”
Another staffer confirmed the British sovereign, 76, and his elder son are “prone to tantrums” if “things are not done to their liking.”
Quinn told Fox that William’s behavior could be a result of having an “emotionally damaging childhood” — not just from his mother Princess Diana’s death when he was just 15 but also when she and Charles divorced so publicly.
“All the unpleasantness between his parents was played out on the world stage. Meanwhile, he was looked after by paid staff,” the author noted.
“For much of that time, it created an adult in William who was very needy. He loved spending time with Kate’s family because, unlike his, they were very warm, very close with each other, very emotionally aware.”
Quinn said William’s childlike outbursts were much more frequent back when he started dating Middleton if “things didn’t go his way.”
“He was still this emotionally needy child who grew up into an emotionally needy adult,” he explained, acknowledging that the prince’s temper tantrums are “less so now” at this stage in the couple’s lives.
Page Six has reached out to Kensington Palace for comment.
