Kate and her children will have the staunch support of her Middleton family as she battles to beat cancer.

Her mother Carole, 69, and father Michael, 74, are understood to have been on hand to care for Kate since her abdominal surgery in January and during the ‘incredibly tough couple of months’ that followed.

Carole is described as being ‘indispensable’ and is playing a ‘crucial’ role in caring for her grandchildren.

It is understood she will continue to provide hands-on support to Kate and William.

She was spotted driving Kate on the school run earlier this month.

The Princess of Wales will have the staunch support of the Middleton family in her battle to overcome cancer

Her mother Carole, 69, and father Michael, 74, are understood to have been on hand to support Catherine since her surgery in January

Hours after the world learned of Kate’s cancer, her brother James, 36, shared a never-before-seen holiday picture of them as happy children, with a green hill in the background.

He added: ‘Over the years, we have climbed many mountains together. As a family, we will climb this one with you too.’

Kate’s sister Pippa, 40, who also has three children, has said that the family spend ‘a lot of time together’ and that she attended therapy sessions with Kate to help entrepreneur James overcome his clinical depression.

The Middleton family live close to each other. Kate’s parents are in Bucklebury, a 40-minute drive from Windsor, and Pippa is close by too in Berkshire.

Catherine’s brother James, 36, released for the first time a picture of them as children on holiday

Kate’s sister Pippa, 40, who also has three children, has said that the family spend ‘a lot of time together’

After the wedding, William saw the Middletons more often than he saw his own father. They are said to have helped to ground him. There are suggestions he even referred to his father-in-law Michael as ‘dad’.

Brother James proved his loyalty to Kate at her wedding, giving a reading to a global audience of two billion despite suffering from dyslexia.

He had to re-type his reading phonetically to learn it.

‘At the end of the day, whether it was a little church or Westminster Abbey didn’t matter. It was me, as a brother, doing a reading for my sister and her husband at their wedding and I wanted to do it right,’ he said.