Prince Edward’s wife Sophie has stepped out of the shadow of underage royalty and has revealed herself as Queen Elizabeth’s ‘royal rock’.
Sophie, Countess of Wessex, 56, is married to the Queen’s youngest son, Prince Edward, 57, and according to royal insiders, she shares a close relationship with Her Majesty.
“She is trusted and trusted by the Queen in a way that I could not say applies to the Duchess of Cambridge or the Duchess of Cornwall,” an insider told the UK’s Express. “She’s like Her Majesty’s other daughter – they’re so close.”
One courtier explained: “If you ask who Her Majesty’s favorite child is, it is none of them, it is her daughter-in-law.”
The Queen would often ask her daughter-in-law to accompany her in the car before going to church, as she “finds Sophie’s presence soothing.”
Sophie was the first family member to speak publicly about the death of her father-in-law, Prince Philip. During a special divine service in honor of the Duke of Edinburgh, Sophie emotionally described his last moments.
‘It was good for him. It was so gentle, ”she said. It was as if someone took his hand and left. Very, very peaceful, and that’s all you want for someone, isn’t it? “
Prince Edward began dating Sophie Rhys-Jones in 1994, who grew up in a middle-class family in 1994. Her father is a retired sales executive for a tire and rubber company and her mother was a charity worker and secretary. Her godfather is actor Thane Bettany, her father’s stepbrother and the father of “WandaVision” actor Paul Bettany.
Sophie’s pre-royal career was in public relations, and that’s how she met Prince Edward. The two began dating in 1993 and were married in June 1999.
But, like many members of the royal family, she is not immune to scandals. She was founded in 2001 by a tabloid newspaper reporter posing as an Arab sheik supposedly courting her PR firm. In their secret conversation, Sophie called the wife of then Prime Minister Tony Blair Cherie “absolutely horrible, horrible, horrible.”
The following year, it was announced that Sophie was quitting her “day job” to focus more on royal activities and social obligations.
The path to parenthood for Sophie and Edward was not an easy one. In 2001, Sophie was found to be suffering from a life-threatening ectopic pregnancy that required emergency surgery. Two years later, she became a mother when she gave birth to daughter Louise prematurely via emergency caesarean section after a placental abruption that caused severe blood loss to both mother and baby.
Due to premature birth, Louise was born with esotropia, an eye condition in which one or both eyes turn inward. She underwent two surgeries to correct the problem. In 2007, Sophie gave birth to son James, Viscount Severn, who at the age of 13 was the youngest caretaker at his grandfather’s funeral service on Saturday.
Sophie is clearly not a diva: In a cost-cutting measure in 2012, her full-time police protection detail was cut short and is now only used when on royal duty. Edward would be furious about the decision, but his wife was happy about it.
A friend told The Sun: “She would rather not have the police 24 hours a day. It meant she could pick up the kids from school on her own, without any hassle. “
Sophie and Edward’s children have no royal titles. They could have been awarded the titles of princess and prince, but their parents decided otherwise.
“We try to raise them with the realization that they will most likely have to work for a living,” Sophie told The Sunday Times. “That’s why we decided not to use HRH titles. They have them and can decide to use them [when they turn] 18, but it is highly unlikely. “
“They go to a regular school,” Sophie went on. “They go to friends for sleepovers and parties. During the weekend we walk a lot of dogs and we stay with friends. I think not all grandparents live in a castle, but where you go is not the most important part, or who they are. When they are with the queen, she is their grandmother. “
Louise was said to be a favorite of the Queen, and Prince Philip was also very close to his granddaughter. They both loved riding a carriage, and Prince Philip is said to have left two of his ponies with Lady Windsor and his Notlaw Storm, the four-wheeled carriage that was seen on television at the funeral last Saturday.