Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge, criticised over quick hospital exit

MOTHERS are damned if they do and damned if they don’t. There are few other instances in life when the choices someone makes are so intensely scrutinised and freely criticised by those with no claim to the outcome.

MOTHERS are damned if they do and damned if they don’t. There are few other instances in life when the choices someone makes are so intensely scrutinised and freely criticised by those with no claim to the outcome.

Almost every mum can recount a time they were dressed down by a stranger for drinking coffee while pregnant, breastfeeding in public or popping a dummy in the mouth of a crying infant. Judgment is cast on everything from caesarean births and epidurals to controlled crying and bottle feeding by critics who rarely know the full story.

The Duchess of Cambridge with her newborn on the steps of St Mary’s Hospital, Paddington. Photo credit: James Whatling/MEGA TheMegaAgency.com

As such, the polished appearance of Catherine, the Duchess of Cambridge, on the steps of St Mary’s Hospital a mere seven hours after giving birth to her third child was always going to prove controversial.

On the one hand, as wife to one future king of England and mother to another, Catherine carries the burden of duty and expectation that comes with her privileged position. On the other hand, there was a woman with well-documented hyperemesis gravidarum – debilitating morning sickness – cast from her hospital bed and paraded to the world once contractions stopped shuddering her body.

Damned if she did, damned if she didn’t.

As images of a smiling yet visibly tired Catherine, accompanied by her husband William and their hours-old son, were beamed around the world, her subjects were choosing a side. Royal commentator Victoria Murphy told Good Morning America the Duchess, in a tailored dress by British ready-to-wear designer Jenny Packham, sheer pantyhose, nude heels and professionally styled hair and make-up, was “the envy of women around the world”.

Commoners took to social media to admire Catherine as “inspirational”, “stunning”, “superwoman” and “a badass”.

However, the haste with which she made her glossy exit from the hospital’s private Lindo Wing was met with similarly speedy backlash.

The move has particularly irked mothers, who took to social media to slam the pressure placed on new mums to “look fabulous” post-partum. Many have shared photographs of what they looked like seven hours after giving birth and recounted tales of exhaustion and emotion.

The move also split panellists on Channel 10’s The Project, with Meshel Laurie denouncing those who labelled the Duchess an inspiration. “You know what would be inspiring? If when they came into her room and said, ‘Alright mate, up you get, hair and make-up; let’s get out there’, she said, ‘Don’t be an idiot – get out! I’ve just had a baby!” Laurie railed.

Co-host Carrie Bickmore, a mother like Laurie, defended Catherine and suggested the choice to leave hospital may not have been her own. “The expectation on that poor girl. It must suck. She does it so, so effortlessly.”

Early discharges are not without precedent; Catherine left hospital with Princess Charlotte 10 hours after her birth. “It’s very emotional,” the Duchess admitted to reporters outside St Mary’s Hospital when she emerged with Prince George in her arms in 2013. “It’s such a special time. I think any parent will know what this feeling feels like.”

Catherine and her as-yet-unnamed son are resting in their palatial home, but her reprieve from social commentators and keyboard warriors will be short-lived. Her first official public engagement, Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s wedding, is in just 23 days’ time.