Queen Camilla celebrated her 77th birthday on July 17th, the same day as the State Opening of Parliament. She spent her birthday dripping in (stolen) diamonds and taking “glamour shots” for fixed-position photographers. But this was apparently a terrible way to spend a birthday, at least according to her nearest and dearest. Camilla hates all of these state occasions where she has to wear couture and millions in jewels. No, of course that’s not her smug “I won” face, how dare you! Obviously, The Mail’s Becky English got a big exclusive this week about the past year of Camilla’s life. Shockingly, there’s no mention of the Sussexes (Camilla’s “friends” usually love to bitch about them) but they’re pushing the “Camilla is so worried about Charles” angle. Some highlights:

Spending her birthday at the State Opening of Parliament. ‘It’s not the tip-top way she would choose to be spending her birthday,’ one close friend tells me, ‘but you won’t ever hear a single word of complaint. About anything, really. For someone who wasn’t born into the Royal Family, she’s got an extraordinarily strong sense of duty and the temperament to cope.’

Finding out about Charles’s cancer: They spent the weekend together at Sandringham, processing the news privately, before Camilla insisted on undertaking a long-planned engagement opening a Maggie’s cancer care centre in London while the King embarked on a debilitating course of treatment. ‘The public had no idea what she was going through. She was speaking to patients, survivors and even the families of those who had lost their lives to this awful disease in front of the cameras. And she couldn’t . . . she didn’t . . . even blink. That takes serious guts,’ a friend says.

She’d never been so worried: Another reveals candidly: ‘In private people had never seen her so worried. Forget who they are for a second. Look at it from a human level. Her beloved husband was facing a very serious condition. The battle of his life. It was hugely tough.’

Camilla is Charles’s gatekeeper and his fiercest protector. ‘His Majesty is never one to sit still and do nothing. He always wants to work and even cancer wasn’t going to stop him. But it’s fair to say that his wife hasn’t always been of the same opinion,’ says one person who knows them both well. ‘There is really only once voice in the room that he listens to. And that’s not the doctor’s. She is the only person who can persuade him that he needs to pace himself in order to recover and she’s pretty firm when she has to be. She’s definitely put her foot down as much as she could in recent months. They have always been a team but now you couldn’t get a cigarette paper between them.’

They still spend weekends apart though: That’s not to say that the King and Queen don’t afford each other space. They absolutely do. While Charles is content to potter around at Windsor or Highgrove at weekends, Camilla will still often bolt alone to Ray Mill, her private Wiltshire home, known as her ‘decompression chamber’. She can tend to her beloved gardens, hang out with pals and even walk the dogs without anyone batting an eyelid.

She plans to go on vacation without Charles this summer: In fact, I understand she is planning, as usual, to take them and her five grandchildren away on holiday to Europe for a week or so this summer, while her husband remains at home.

Camilla is still tight with her ex-husband: Unconventionally, she still speaks several times a week to their father, her former husband Andrew Parker Bowles, who has remained an incredibly good friend and sounding board despite their divorce.

The hate she still gets for what she did to Diana is water off a duck’s back. ‘Yes, there’s a caucus of people on social media who use nasty terms and reference difficult times past, but honestly her attitude to that is they are the unshiftables,’ a source tells me. ‘Nobody, not least of all Her Majesty, worries about what they are saying. She has never gone through life looking backwards, she is always looking ahead.’

[From The Daily Mail]

Just the fact that a source sniffed about “a caucus of people on social media who use nasty terms and reference difficult times past” tells me that it actually bothers Camilla a great deal. She’s mad that people still don’t see that she “won,” that her victory was secured when Diana died. Instead, she’s continuously reminded that she lives alongside the ghost of Diana to millions of people. As for Camilla being the most worried ever… I actually do think she was worried, but her behavior and attitude was rather smug and self-satisfied. Her people were even briefing the media that Camilla was “practically ruling solo.” Good times.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Backgrid, Cover Images.