Queen Elizabeth’s passing in 2022 brought closure to a significant chapter in the history of Buckingham Palace. While the entire nation mourned her loss, it was even more bitter for the immediate family, who never truly had a moment to let the grief sink in. Speaking of the former queen’s son, Charles, things were altogether hasty when, without a second thought, he was announced to become King Charles III.
This transition was rapid and came with an enormous amount of responsibility towards his subjects. However, according to many insiders, the reigning monarch has since drifted away from his usual personality and has undergone a complete transformation following his mother’s demise.
King Charles’s last goodbye to his mother Queen Elizabeth II 🥺💔🕊️#QueenElizabethII
pic.twitter.com/C9vvuRG8Dm— The British Prince (@freedom_007__) September 8, 2025
One of the harshest realities of being a royal is the inevitable change in position within the family hierarchy. Things were the same for Charles, as it did not take a minute more for the state to declare him the next king after his mother, Queen Elizabeth II. While losing a parent is an unexplainable ordeal, it was all the more tough for Charles to show his emotions now, especially since everything was now happening in the public eye. As a dutiful son, he was there right beside his mother when her health had just begun to decline.
However, he was unable to be with Queen Elizabeth in her final moments, and a phone call from his sister, Princess Anne, changed everything for King Charles III. Replacing a seven-decade-long monarchical history was not easy, and there was heavy skepticism about whether the public would grow attached to their king from now on. Naturally, with all the mounting stress and pressure of being the next king, Charles was often spotted losing his cool on even the most trifling of things.
For instance, a book-signing event in Ireland made Charles quite irritable after his pen unexpectedly started malfunctioning. At the same time, it is not something totally uncommon to believe that the issue of a non-working pen was, in fact, a peek into his disturbed and stressed persona, and that he had already lost a lot of patience. Despite inheriting a lot of things from his mother and, in extension, from the state, Charles III experienced a distancing from the public at large, who seemed not to be quite willing to accept him in place of the late queen. Moreover, Charles continued to draw criticism from behind closed doors, as the 77-year-old attempted to address and correct the issues of the past.
Besides heading royal duties as a monarch, Charles III also became the new face of his own country. His pictures were featured on coins and banknotes, a fact that many were not willing to accept. Besides this, several other hurdles came his way, including the bombshell revelations by his younger son, Harry, and daughter-in-law, Meghan Markle, in their tell-all video, after having stepped out of the Firm. According to sources, “The hope is that once the dust has settled, the family will be able to move on and put the past behind them.”
While Charles never publicly expressed an opinion on what others said, or even what his own son wrote in the memoir, his silence seemed all the more deafening.
Unlike the previous royals, Charles III also implemented stricter rules and policies to follow, including reportedly stripping royal titles from several family members. This task was undoubtedly met with major backlash from these individuals. Amid all these plans, the major crisis rang the doorbell after the king, along with Princess Catherine, got diagnosed with cancer, something which weakened him to an extent.
