Queen Elizabeth was suffering through cancer in the last months of her life, according to well-connected author Gyles Brandreth. Brandreth, in his new book Elizabeth: An Intimate Portrait, the Daily Mail reported, writes: “I had heard that the queen had a form of myeloma—bone marrow cancer—which would explain her tiredness and weight loss and those ‘mobility issues’ we were often told about during the last year or so of her life.
“The most common symptom of myeloma is bone pain, especially in the pelvis and lower back, and multiple myeloma is a disease that often affects the elderly. Currently, there is no known cure, but treatment—including medicines to help regulate the immune system and drugs that help prevent the weakening of the bones—can reduce the severity of its symptoms and extend the patient’s survival by months or two to three years.”
In the days preceding her death on September 8, 2022, Brandreth writes that the queen had Sunday lunch with the Right Reverend Dr Iain Greenshields, the vicar of the local Braemar and Crathie Parish Church. “They talk about the queen’s childhood, her horses, church affairs (she is ‘well up to speed’) and her sadness at what is happening in Ukraine.” She also spoke to Clive Cox, one of her favorite racehorse trainers, as well as meeting at Balmoral an outgoing Prime Minister (Boris Johnson) and anointing a new one (Liz Truss, whose tenure ended up being the shortest of any prime minister).
Brandreth also says he does not believe that the queen was, as reported, at Prince Philip’s bedside when he died in April 2021.
“That morning, he went to the bathroom, helped by a nurse. When he came back, he said he felt a little faint and wanted help getting back into bed. The nurse called the Duke’s valet and the queen’s page, Paul Whybrew, for help—and he died before the queen could be called,” Brandreth writes. He adds that the couple would go “weeks” without seeing each other later in their lives, the queen recognizing that Philip did not want to be “fussed over.” The pandemic bought them back into close living quarters again, and they both enjoyed it, Brandreth said.
In a second extract, reported the Mail, Brandreth said the queen had liked Meghan Markle, and did “everything to make her feel welcome” into the family. The queen was “devoted” to Harry, but thought he was “perhaps a little too in-love” with Meghan. Brandreth said the queen told Meghan: “You can carry on being an actress if you like—that’s your profession, after all.” On the bombshells told by the couple to Oprah Winfrey, the queen was more concerned with Harry’s well-being rather than “this television nonsense,” as she allegedly called it.
Even more fabulously, when Prince Andrew whined about the Oprah interview, the queen reminded him of the time his ex-wife Sarah Ferguson gave an interview to Oprah.
While other family members found it “bewildering” that Harry and Meghan named their daughter Lilibet, as a tribute to the queen’s nickname, the queen said it was “pretty and seems just right.” Brandreth also says that courtiers refer to Harry and Meghan as “persons who live overseas.”
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