A cancer diagnosis is something that should bring people together. Unfortunately what the Duke of Sussex has said and written about the Princess of Wales can’t be erased.

Following abdominal surgery and weeks of speculation about her health, the Princess of Wales (formerly known as Kate Middleton) made a heartbreaking announcement revealing her cancer diagnosis and that she has started “preventative chemotherapy.”

The news not only shocked royal fans all over the world but was also a surprise to Prince Harry and Meghan Markle, who reportedly found out the same way and the same time the rest of the public did on March 22. The duke and duchess later released a brief statement that read: “We wish health and healing for Kate and the family, and hope they are able to do so privately and in peace.”

Some royal watchers criticized the Sussexes’ message noting that they refused to use their sister-in-law’s Princess of Wales title, which proves that their relationship is still very fractured. It’s also sad to think how close Harry and Kate once were but now seem to be worlds apart because of what the prince can’t take back.

When the duke and the former Suits star sat down for their bombshell interview with Oprah Winfrey in 2021, it was Meghan who spoke about Kate and disputed reports that she made the princess cry after a bridesmaid dress fitting. Two years later, Prince Harry had his turn and backed up his wife’s side of the story that Kate made her cry while going into detail and revealing private text messages between the two women in his memoir Spare.

The duke also claimed that the princess was taken aback when the duchess asked to borrow her lip gloss at an event and “grimaced” when Meghan squeezed some gloss onto her finger and applied it. And in another passage, Harry took the blame off himself and shifted it on his sister-in-law saying she and Prince William encouraged him to wear the Nazi costume to a party.

“I phoned Willy and Kate, asked what they thought (between a pilot and Nazi costume). ‘Nazi uniform’ they said.” The prince added that when he brought the costume home and tried it on “they both howled” with laughter. Royal expert and historian Dr. Tessa Dunlop opined that Harry must wish he could take some things he said and wrote about Kate back now given the serious circumstances with her health.

“When you do discover that your sister-in-law has cancer and you’ve written stuff that can’t be retracted, that’s quite a painful place to be in,” Dunlop told Us Weekly. “They deliberately criticize the monarchy [and then offer] themselves as an alternative to monarchy. So then when the monarchy is in trouble, we do kind of make a comparison. Can Harry and Meghan really hold themselves off as the caring example now? “They’re certainly going to have to be careful of their timing with any releases so that it doesn’t look opportunistic. When that comes creeping in the door, that just reframes everything.”