It’s been reported that Kate moved boarding schools when she was a teenager due to bullying
Our teenage years can often be tough, as we navigate puberty, our first loves and questionable fashion choices. It can also be a time when bullying is rife. In one survey, almost 60% of parents with children aged 14–18 reported them being bullied.
It’s hard to believe that the Duchess of Cambridge, one of the most admired women in the world, was once bullied herself.
But when Kate attended all-girls boarding school Downe House in Berkshire, apparently she was bullied so badly that she became "thin and pale".
It is believed that the bullying may have started because Kate was a day student at the school. As she went home to her parents each night, the future Duchess may have had less of an opportunity to bond with her fellow pupils who were boarders.
In the end, Kate’s parents Carole and Michael ended up pulling her out of the £28,000-a-year school.
Kate moved to mixed boarding school Marlborough College in Wiltshire, where she joined the hockey team and made lots of friends.
One of her roommates, Gemma Williamson, told the Daily Mail: "Apparently she had been bullied very badly and she certainly looked thin and pale. She had very little confidence."
Kate’s house tutor Joan Gall also spoke to the newspaper: “When [Kate] arrived she was very quiet. Coming into a big school like Marlborough was difficult, but she settled in quickly."
She continued: "It was like a big, happy family. We would do things like bake cakes and watch videos." Meanwhile, Kate’s Housemistress Ann Patching said:
“She didn’t make a big deal about it. I can’t remember if it was her or Carole who mentioned Downe House. It was a concern, but they were determined to move on.”
Kate became so popular at the school, that she was voted the “person most likely to be loved by everybody” in the yearbook. They probably didn’t expect the scale at which this would become true.
