The editors of Australia's biggest women's magazines are expecting an extremely difficult delivery, and that's well before the Duchess of Sussex breaks into a sweat for the arrival of her first royal baby.
Keeping mum: Meghan, The Duchess of Sussex, doing things her way.Credit:PA
Yes, after enjoying a bumper couple of years courtesy of the "Markle Sparkle", the teams at Woman's Day, New Idea, Who, OK!, The Australian Women's Weekly and NW have been thrown a curve ball after Prince Harry and his wife announced to the world they were keeping their baby's arrival a mostly private matter.
Well, for a little bit.
There will be no photo opportunity outside the birthing suite, a la Kate and Wills, which has been the tradition of the Royal Family since Prince William was presented to the world by his mother Princess Diana in 1982.
Princess Kate and Prince William smile as they show off their newborn Princess Charlotte in 2015 from The Lindo Wing of St Mary’s Hospital in London.Credit:AP
Rather, the new blue blood bub is expected to be introduced to the world via the Sussex's much-scrutinised social media platforms, and only after the couple has had time to acquaint themselves with their bundle of joy in private.
For Fiona Connolly, the editor-in-chief at Woman's Day, OK! and NW magazines, a shot of a royal pinkie could be all she gets to launch hundreds of thousands of magazines across the country in coming days.
The only thing Connolly knows for sure is that her printing presses and trucks are on stand-by.
"The Palace has told us they will release a statement when Meghan goes into labour and then they will spend an undisclosed amount of family time alone. From then it could be hours or several days before they will have one photographer and one videographer capturing the big reveal and that makes it almost impossible for us to finalise a royal baby plan," Connolly says.
"Will it be just one image distributed to media? Will she release it on Instagram or go via the Palace press office? Can we expect another Vanity Fair exclusive?
"I don’t have a crystal ball but I’m confident she will follow the path of many Hollywood stars who are first-time parents and build anticipation with an intriguing image of the baby on Instagram first – let’s call it a cute little royal foot or hand – before releasing anything more official."
Emma Nolan, who is steering the royal coverage for rival publications New Idea and Who, agrees with Connolly: "Harry and Meghan are known to break the rules, and that has been unsettling for some royal traditionalists."
Luckily for Meghan, those royal traditionalists are no longer calling the shots.
Queen Elizabeth II had all four of her children in royal residences, and so did Queen Victoria. The royal mothers brought in their own doctors and midwives to set up makeshift maternity wards.
The Lindo Wing has only been used in more recent times, becoming a handy wall for the legions of media that have traditionally descended to document the new royal arrivals.
No doubt the hospital's facilities are it's biggest drawcard. During Princess Charlotte's birth, the Duchess of Cambridge had two midwives, two obstetricians, three anesthesiologists, four surgical staff members, two special care staffers, four paediatricians, and a lab technician.
There has been nothing confirmed about how or where Meghan will be delivering her baby.
As for this thing about "privacy" for one of the world's most famous families, who could blame Meghan given what some of their predecessors have been through?
Baby Prince Charles christening at Buckingham Palace in 1948.
Before Prince Charles was born in 1948, the British home secretary customarily attended all of the royal births to supposedly "verify" the event.
This was somewhat problematic when Home Secretary John Robert Clynes travelled to Scotland in 1930 to witness the birth of Princess Margaret at Glamis Castle. Margaret, the daughter of the future King George VI and sister of Elizabeth, the future queen, was born two weeks after her due date but Clynes had to remain in Scotland on alert until she made her debut.
And there were reportedly 42 "officials" called in to verify the birth of King James II's son James Francis Edward in 1688 at St James's Palace.
And still the birth was plagued by rumours spread by the "cheap broadsheets" of the day that the baby had been smuggled into the bed chamber in a warming pan. Though my personal favourite conspiracy theory was it had been sneaked into the bed through a secret door in the bedhead.
More recently the Queen showed off the royal babies on the balcony at Buckingham Palace in front of huge crowds, but without any of the awkward theatrics displayed by the likes of Michael Jackson and in the days before telescopic lenses.
Indeed, given the Royal family's track record it would seem somewhat prudent that the Duchess of Sussex plans to keep things a little more low key, regardless of how problematic that makes things for a few magazine editors.
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